


The steady throne of restless hope

by lillaseptember



Series: There's no greater gift than love [1]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, Coming Out, F/F, F/M, Minor Character Death, Minor Injuries, Non-Linear Narrative, Post-Canon, a tiniest cameo of dragons but copious dragon references, haddock family feels, i saw 'the hidden world' a month ago and have been constantly crying ever since, minor nuffink haddock/original female character, vague illnesses, zephyr is gay because i SAID SO
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-16
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2020-01-14 18:15:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18481693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lillaseptember/pseuds/lillaseptember
Summary: There weren’t dragons in Zephyr’s world anymore, but she knew what it was to fly.That meant that she knew to never take anything for granted.Or; Zephyr, learning, loving, losing, and living.





	The steady throne of restless hope

**Author's Note:**

> This… Started out as a 1k drabble about little newly-made-big-sister-Zephyr and Hiccup bonding. I’m still not quite sure what happened. But here. I know I probably should have split this into parts to be more reader-friendly, but this started out as a one-shot so I’ll be damned that it stays that way. Sorry in advance.

There were dragons when Zephyr’s parents were young.

Granted, there are still dragons in the world. They’re not just _out_ in the world. No, they’re safely tucked away in their own, safe, hidden world. Living, thriving, waiting, until one day, some day, it might be safe for them to return to the world at large again. 

The truth of their continued existence is granted to very, very few. 

But growing up on Berk, the truth is bestowed upon you through the marrow of your bones. That is their luck in being the children of the guarded knowledge. Berk is the protector of dragons, the very, very few who knew that dragons didn’t actually disappear from the world, but simply found a world of their own where they could be safe.

Zephyr isn’t only a child of Berk though, a child of the knowledge and protection; she is the daughter of Hiccup and Astrid Haddock, the two finest dragon riders the world had ever seen. 

The truth of dragons soars through her very blood.

She grew up on stories of dragons; of Night Furies and Deadly Nadders and Stormcutters, of Red Deaths, dragon alphas, and the great departure. 

The truth of dragons is granted to very few, but when it comes to Zephyr’s own generation, the instance of actually meeting a dragon is granted to even fewer. That is where she has always counted herself very, _very_ lucky.

Zephyr didn’t grow up on dragon back, the way her parents had. But she does know what it is to fly.

She knows what it’s like to feel the wind upon your face when you’re hundreds of feet up in the air, she knows the cottony structure of clouds under her fingertips, the sensation of keep going up, up, up, higher and farther still, as if there was no limit to the sky. She knows what it’s like to feel your heart soar across the endless vastness of the world from up above.

That means that she also knows of the terrifying fear of falling.

She still remembers the first time she had climbed up on Stormfly’s back, and the terrifying thrill as her mom’s best friend had flapped her wings and risen high, high, higher into the sky. Her mom’s arms had been secure around her and the dragon had been warm and steady below, but she had still not been able to ignore the stuttering of her heart as she had watched their ship turn into an infinitesimal dot in the endless ocean below.

Flying had been like nothing she had ever experienced before, and it had been like finding a piece of her that had always been missing. She had still been very young, but she had thought that she might have had a better understanding of why her parents always carried such an inexplicable sadness within them. They had known what it was to fly, had known it well enough to take it for granted, and then they had lost it.

Stormfly hadn’t even been able to circle around the tiny dot that was their ship more than once before Zephyr had fallen in love. She had known the dangers of it; she had known that it would never be a part of her world the way it had been for her parents. And yet she had fallen in love, and she had tucked that knowledge away close to her heart, keeping it safe in a way like the dragons were safe from the rest of the world in their hidden world.

Zephyr loved flying, but it had always also frightened her to a degree. Not so much the flying in itself, even if she would never be able to say that her stomach didn’t turn every time Stormfly or Toothless or Cloudjumper dove nose first into an endless drop. No, it wasn’t the flying so much as it was the possibilities of falling. Crashing.

Burning.

Zephyr trusted dragons, would most likely put her life in their hands if it came to it. But still she could never quite get the anxious pecking out of the back of her head. _What if I fall off, what if the dragons won’t be able to catch me, what if I catch on fire, what if, what if, what if?_

_What if I fall to the ground and never get up again?_

Zephyr’s nervous tick was something she had inherited from her dad, and was not only deafening when it came to flying. _Listen to your fear, but don’t let it rule you_ , dad used to say, and she had always tried her Thor blasted darndest at following his advice. Some days were easier than others, and once she was on the back of a dragon, it was the simplest time of all.

She loved flying after all, and she wasn’t about to let some senseless worry stop her from doing just that.

There weren’t dragons in Zephyr’s world anymore, but she knew what it was to fly.

That meant that she knew to never take anything for granted.

* * *

Zephyr had never been much of a sailor. She knew her way around a rigging and a sail, but that was about it. Nuffink was the one born with salt water in his blood and the east wind in his lungs. 

Zephyr counted every time she returned to the docks without her hull looking like she had gotten into a scrap with a bloodthirsty shark a success.

Which meant that this excursion was far from it.

The instructions had been brief and scanty, scribbled on a piece of parchment in a messy scrawl; _Sail to Fenrir’s Fang and then straight west - follow the shoreline._

She wasn’t even sure what shoreline she was meant to follow, or what she was supposed to find at the end of her quest. After sailing past the Fang she had then sailed past three more islets, all more desolate than the previous, before she had stumbled upon this larger piece of land that could almost be called an island. Following its shoreline was easier said than done though.

It was ragged and craggly, stone cliffs crawling down from the mainland and into the sea, stacks sticking up along the shore and more hiding underneath. She had almost gotten stuck on its scraggly edges more than once, and her patience was growing precariously thin. 

The morning had been thick with fog, clinging to her clothes, clogging her lungs, and weaving through rocky cliff sides. The morning had given way to an unbearable sun though, sharp and uncompromising, one of the very few days of the year that Berk and its closest surroundings were actually _hot._ Zephyr was having trouble keeping her course straight, the sun biting into her eyes and the uneven shoreline getting harder and harder to navigate through.

Images of a dinghy much like her own, smashed to pieces on a shoreline much like this one, its sail ripped to pieces and its sailor barely alive and a fear so bitter that Zephyr had never tasted anything like it neither before nor since, suddenly filled her mind. She suddenly felt so infinitely small and helpless, the ocean stretched far and wide behind her and she could just disappear into the endless unknown and no one would be any wiser. 

_Gods_ , she hated sailing.

 _Follow the shoreline_ , Loki’s ass, she was going to demonstrate just what she could follow-

Before she could actually finish that threat, what she guessed was the fruits of her endless hours of labor finally came into view. A clearing; a natural inlet along the shore, leading up to a cliffless beach, sand the colour of ivory and a forest grove that looked like it had been carved out of emeralds weaving into an endless blanket of trees behind it.

Zephyr didn’t have much time to appreciate the scenery though, as she made quick work of running her already banged up boat ashore and getting to the real reason of her expedition.

“What were you thinking?” she shouted, her voice getting closer to hysterical territories than she had intended, jumping into the shallows of the shore, just abandoning the rigging and not caring if the boat drifted off to sea without her again. It probably didn't matter, anyway. By the rate her day was going, it would barely hold up to be a donation to the fledgling class at the Sailing Academy at the end of it.

Signy had been waiting for her, with a weather eye to the east, one hand shielding her from the sun and the other propped on her hip. She greeted Zephyr with a sharp and mischievous and careless grin.

And Zephyr had never regretted a decision more in her life than she regretted handing over her heart to this impossible, reckless, heedless, fearless, ingenious, and absolutely marvelous wonder of a girl.

She felt like Stormfly had just thrown her off of the edge of the world, only to catch her before she finally plummeted into the great unknown.

But then again, she had always loved the terrifying thrill of flying.

That didn’t mean that she was letting her girlfriend off the hook that easily.

“Do you have any idea- _Any idea_ , of how terrifying it is to think ‘is this when I’m finally going to lose her?’ every single time you do something like this?” she said, thinking back to the blank terror of the morning, of not finding Signy at home, not in the arena, her boat mysteriously vanished from the docks, the dockhands not having seen anything, her parents not having had a word of her disappearance, and only finding a scrap of paper wedged into her windowsill. 

To think that when she had asked Zephyr for an early morning date the evening before, Zephyr had thought things would actually get to be _normal_ for once. 

“You’re going to be the death of me,” she said, deflating, most of her fight leaving her as the toll of the long morning finally caught up with her.

Signy squinted as she removed her hand as a shield for her eyes, and her grin turned a little softer, a little gentler, as she walked over to where Zephyr was still standing ankle deep in the shallows. With the waves lapping at their boots, she didn’t seem to have a care in the world as she reached up to brush some of Zephyr’s hair out of her face, one of her thumbs trailing alongside Zephyr’s jaw.

“You’re not going to lose me.”

And while that felt like something that had been lost finally finding its place in Zephyr’s chest again, she was still Zephyr Haddock, her parents’ daughter, the heir of Berk, and Chief in accession, and she could never let matters just be.

“Yes I am. One day or another, we’re all going to be lost to this world,” she said as she put her hands on Signy’s hips and pulled her closer, if only just to get her to take this serious just for _once._ “I just wish you’d stop tempting the Norns and keep bringing your final journey closer than you need to.”

Signy just smiled, that smile that was brighter than the sun and sharper still, and Zephyr couldn’t have stopped her heart from soaring up, up, up into the sky even if she had wanted to.

“Now, where would the fun in that be?”

Zephyr could only sigh, and leaned down to kiss her constantly wayward girlfriend.

She did love the thrill of flying, after all.

* * *

Zephyr’s generation wasn’t only the first generation of New Berk, they were also the first generation in the age without dragons.

The loss was palpable in their parents, in their grandparents, great-grandparents, in everyone who had been alive before the dragons had left. The people of Berk hadn’t only started a new life on their new land, they had also started a whole new lifestyle. A life without dragons. A life after. A life with a loss so ingrained into their society that their children would still feel it generations to come.

Zephyr wasn’t the first born of her generation, far from. But she had been the one to cause the largest impact.

Granted, the firstborn child of the Chief tended to do that.

She had been born during the worst storm of the season, just on the brink of the sweeter but bitter still spring, Thor himself announcing her delivery with thunder and lightning so potent that it shook the entire island. Nothing less to be expected from the birth of the Haddock Heir though, it was said.

She had been a healthy babe, not too small, not too big, not too fussy, not too unflappable. She had been an easy birth, taking quite of her time, but that was to be expected of a firstborn. It was said that the strong west wind had helped carry her into the world, and it was that wind that had given her her name.

And everything had been roses and peaches, as soft and sweet as the spring that her birth had helped bring, up until the significance of all that she lacked had been remembered.

Zephyr couldn’t remember a time when her gender hadn’t been all that her people had seen in her. _Daddy’s little girl_ , they all called her. _The Haddock lass. The girl heir._

It was all said with affection, and she was liked, beloved even, by her people. She was Hiccup and Astrid’s daughter, and she was met with kindness and curiosity and mirth wherever she ventured across the island.

She was the Chief’s daughter, and she had always been looked upon as such. But she had never truly been seen as the Chief’s _heir._

Then, when Zephyr had celebrated her fourth thawfest, the fact that her brother was slowly swelling inside of her mommy’s stomach had first been revealed.

They hadn’t known that he had been a boy back then of course, and he had just been referred to as her babe sibling. Mommy had told Zephyr first of all, except Gothi and gran and grandma probably, but she had specifically told Zephyr before she had told anyone else, even daddy. She had pulled Zephyr into her lap, blown raspberries into her ticklish neck, and told her that she had some very exciting news, and that it was time for Zephyr to become a very big girl indeed.

Because she was meant to become a big sister.

And Zephyr had been excited, had been very excited, had really looked forward to the prospect of having a little babe sibling. Having someone that would look up to her, having someone she could teach all that she had learnt, having someone that she could share all of her secrets that she couldn’t share with either her parents or her friends.

Having another part of her family.

Mommy had told daddy later the same day that she had told Zephyr, once he got home that night. Daddy had just stared at mommy for a really long time, before he had dropped the handful of scrolls he had been holding in order to grab a hold of mommy and swing her up into the air instead. Their shared laughter had warmed the house better than the steady fire in the hearth had.

Then daddy had gotten a worried look in his eyes and had put mommy down on the ground again, saying something about how he had to be careful. Mommy had rolled her eyes and punched him in the arm, saying that she wasn’t a fat yak just yet. Daddy had just smiled at her in response, before walking over to swing Zephyr up in the air instead, much to her giggling delight.

She had always wondered if that was what flying felt like, every time daddy threw her up into the air, only to catch her before she started to fall.

The following seven moon cycles were some of the most exciting in Zephyr’s life; watching her mommy’s belly swell and feeling the life growing inside, impatiently waiting to be let out. Spring turned to summer to autumn to winter, with Zephyr’s mommy and sibling growing in tandem and Zephyr growing alongside them. She had learnt everything she had thought she could possibly learn about being an older sibling, and was impatiently waiting for the day when her babe sister or brother would be born.

She couldn’t wait to meet them, to see them learn and grow and love. And to love them in turn.

Zephyr’s brother was born during one of the most bitterly cold days of the year, and she had hated him from the moment she had first found out about him.

Not because he threatened her position as heir. Oh no, Zephyr had been too young and too naive to think of that. In her mind, as questioned and doubted as she already was, she was still cemented as the Heir of Berk. What could a frail little babe do to threaten her, she who could run fastest of all of the children her age, who wasn’t the very best at tree climbing but who was just behind Agnar, and who had been the first to learn how to whistle?

No, she had had much more legitimate reasons for disliking her little brother.

She had been sent away to her gran’s house when the labor had started, as she had been instructed beforehand that she would. The snow was piled deep over the entire island, and Zephyr’s boots had been damp by the time she finally made it to gran’s, where she had been bundled up in several blankets and placed in front of the fire, inside of gran’s embrace while she had sung all of Zephyr’s favorite songs.

The process of getting a babe out of a mommy’s stomach was a long one Zephyr had been informed, and she had been instructed to stay patient. But as the murky early morning had turned into dusky day and then gloomy night, and she had watched gran glance nervously at the moon hanging low in the sky again, she had known deep in her bones that something was very, very wrong.

She had been sent off to bed nonetheless, curled up in gran’s wide cot with her heavy blankets and the stuffed Stormcutter that Zephyr knew was named Cloudjumper. She had pretended to sleep, because she was very clever ( _the cleverest girl in the entire world_ , her daddy used to say), and had pretended to be asleep still even when her grandma had come by late, very, very late in the night.

“We almost lost ‘em both,” Zephyr had heard grandma tell gran, and she could see gran holding her up when she peeked out from under her blankets. “The babe- A lad, it’s a lad- It was the most gruesome thing ‘ve ever seen. My babe, my wee babe Astrid, ’ve never seen her like this. The pain, oh so much pain. They both almost died.”

Zephyr hadn’t fully understood, until the next morning, when her daddy had finally come to fetch her. He had looked tired, so very tired, and his cheeks had been scratchy like they used to be when he forgot to shave. He had caught her out of the air when she had set off to go see her mommy, and had sat her down by the table beside gran’s fireplace, and had told her that she needed to be patient.

She couldn’t see her mommy just yet. Mommy was tired, very, very tired, and needed to rest. The delivery had hurt, and had hurt a lot, and-

Zephyr’s mommy was hurt.

And it was all her babe brother’s fault.

Her daddy had tried to explain, that it was no ones fault, that sometimes the Gods decided to be cruel even when people didn’t deserve it, but Zephyr had _known._ And she had hated him.

She hated him, hated him, _hated him._

Daddy had scooped her up in his big embrace, had hugged her tight and had brushed his hand over the back of her head, reassured her that it was okay to be scared, okay to be angry, okay to be upset. That mommy couldn’t see her just yet, but that everything was going to be okay, that her mommy and her brother were going to be just fine.

Zephyr hadn’t cared much for the wellbeing of that vile babe brother of hers. She just wanted to see her mommy, and to see that she was really okay.

Daddy had spent the rest of the day with her, curled up in front of gran’s large fireplace, ignoring the bitter cold outside. He had told her stories, of unfamiliar dragons, of newly discovered lands, and adventures that had involved both. He had allowed Zephyr to braid some of his hair, and had laughed that laugh that made Zephyr feel like she was floating on top of a pair of dragon wings of her own.

He had also fallen asleep for a long, long time, but he had looked so tired that Zephyr hadn’t minded. She had just curled up in the familiar warmth of his fur mantle and had enjoyed being able to keep a hold of at least one of her parents.

He had left in the evening again, to return to her mommy, and Zephyr hadn’t been allowed to come with. She had argued, she had thrown a fit, had stomped her feet and had even cried a little, but her daddy wouldn’t budge. Her mommy needed more time to rest, and she would stay with gran for a little while longer.

She had fallen asleep that night, tucked into her gran’s side and hugging Cloudjumper close to her chest, thinking about just how much she despised her brother.

It had been three more days, three more days spent with her dad and three more nights spent with her gran, before she had been allowed to see her mommy again. Daddy had carried her all the way from gran’s house to their own, and had explained the entire way just how careful she would have to be. Mommy might be the strongest person on all of Berk, nay, all the northern seas, _nay_ , in all of the entire world, but she was still hurt. She still had to rest. And Zephyr had to keep all of that in mind.

Every caution her daddy had told her had immediately disappeared from her mind as soon as he had set her down on the floor of his and mommy’s bedroom, and she had seen her mommy for the first time in _four days_.

She had sprinted across the room as fast as the fastest child on Berk was capable of, and had launched herself up onto the bed where her mommy was lying, throwing her arms around her neck as tightly as she knew how, never wanting to let her go again.

She was _Zephyr’s_ mommy, and she wasn’t about to let some stupid little _babe_ take her away.

Zephyr’s daddy had made a weird noise somewhere behind them, but mommy had just shushed him before she had laughed into Zephyr’s hair and scooped her up into an embrace of her own.

“I’ve missed you too, my little breeze,” she had whispered, so low only Zephyr would hear, and she had squeezed her even tighter.

Zephyr had just hugged her, and mommy had hugged her back, for a really long time, until Zephyr was finally convinced that she wasn’t going to disappear. But even as Zephyr realized that, she also realized that that didn’t mean that she wasn’t still _scared._

Tucking herself under her mommy’s chin, she had curled herself up into her arms, and wished she could be a little girl again. Before any of this had happened, when it had just been her, mommy, and daddy; before they had explained that she was going to be a big _sister_.

“I don’t wanna lose you mommy.”

Zephyr had said it as quietly as she could, wanting only mommy to hear it and mommy alone. Mommy had hugged her tighter and kissed the top her her head.

“Oh baby,” she had whispered into her hair. “I’m right here. I’m right here.”

Zephyr had believed that, she really had; she could feel mommy’s strong arms around her, could feel her heartbeat strong against her own chest, felt mommy’s breath blowing into her hair. 

But that hadn’t mean that Zephyr wasn’t still afraid that she would disappear the moment Zephyr let her go.

Zephyr had fallen asleep like that, curled up in her mommy’s arms. When she had woken up again, it had been to daddy’s strong arms curled around her too.

It had taken her a few, tired, moments to realize why she had woken up though.

Crying, loud and grating crying, echoing between the walls, and coming from within her parents’ bedroom.

“I’ll get ‘im,” she had heard her daddy mumble, before reaching over to press a kiss that should probably have landed on mommy’s cheek but ended up mostly on Zephyr’s forehead, and then stumbling out of bed.

It had been her brother. It had been her evil babe brother that had woken them up in the middle of the night, for apparently no reason at all.

Zephyr had turned around in her mommy’s arms, and had clung onto her possessively. He was never going to hurt mommy ever again, not if she had anything to say about it.

It had taken time, to learn how to love her brother- Nuffink, as he was eventually named. It took time, to accept the fact that he hadn’t intentionally hurt their mother, that he wanted her harmed as little as Zephyr wanted her harmed.

It took watching her daddy rock him to sleep at night, singing the same songs he used to sing to Zephyr, with the same look in his eyes that he usually only had while looking at mommy or herself. It took watching her mommy nurse him, watching her continue to selflessly give him life, even when he had nearly taken hers. It took, reluctantly, giving him his first toy, a rattle Gobber had carved, and listening to his appreciative nonsense babe gibberish in return.

It took seeing his first smile, and realizing that he had the same lopsided grin that Zephyr herself had.

She would probably have warmed up to him sooner, had it not been for the betrayal from he rest of the island.

 _A proper heir_ , they called him, as if they thought Zephyr wouldn’t understand. _The boy heir_ , they said. No _daddy’s little boy_ , or _the Haddock lad_ , for Nuffink, no. He was only ever spoken of as if he was the child her parents had always waited for, always spoken of as if Zephyr wasn’t standing right in front of them, understanding every single implication of their words.

She wasn’t the only one that heard, nor the only one that understood though.

Daddy had sat her down one day, on the hills leading down into the village, and said that it was time for a _Serious Big Girl Conversation_. He had explained that Vikings could be thickheaded, and forgetful at times, and that Nuffink did not in any way change the fact that Zephyr was daddy’s heir, if she wanted to be. The rest of the tribe may not have understood it yet, but the most important part was that she and daddy did, and the rest would work out in time.

It was also important that she hadn’t blamed Nuffink for any of the misunderstandings; he was still just a babe, had just arrived in the world, and asked and wanted for nothing more than to just be loved by his big sister. He had not asked to assume her status as heir, no matter what the rest of Berk thought.

And he was her brother, and even though he wasn’t perfect and he wasn’t vicious, maybe that was the way it should be. He was her brother, and he loved her parents and even seemed to love her as he grew and learned and lived, and she learned how to love him in turn.

Even if his introduction to the world had nearly lost them their mother.

* * *

Zephyr, and many of her peers, she was aware, had always felt- Rootless, of sorts. _They were the generation of change_ , her dad used to say. They were the foundation of New Berk, and they were themselves the very roots that would shape and sustain generations to come. They were the children of a new land, a new lifestyle, a new _life_ , and they were setting and staking a new course, with no guidelines to follow.

Zephyr had always known that her father was a controversial Chief, that he wasn’t grandpa Stoick, and that the constantly shifting nature of life on New Berk wasn’t only due to the loss of dragons and the gain of a new land. It was also due to the nature of her dad, of the way he was constantly pushing boundaries, of always thinking in new patterns, of perpetually questioning traditions.

There was one thing that neither he, nor the rest of Berk, had ever questioned though.

Zephyr had been in that weird place between girlhood and womanhood when she had first had to face the fact that her interests didn’t exactly lay where most other girls’ did.

She had been 14 and had attended warrior training, as most other children of Berk did at that age. Zephyr had never been much of a warrior, even if she was Astrid Hofferson-Haddock’s daughter, but she had enjoyed her time in training anyway. She may never become Berk’s fiercest warrior, but her time at the Warrior Academy had taught her many invaluable things. 

She may never be Berk’s best swordsman, but she _did_ know how to wield a sword; she may never become Berk’s best axe slinger, but she _did_ know how to throw a hatchet with some sense of accuracy; she may not be Berk’s best brawler, but she _did_ know how to hold her own ground.

But that wasn’t the only reason she had enjoyed her time at the Academy.

The Warrior Academy was officially run by Gobber and Eret, son of Eret, but they had always had a minor armada of young warriors assisting them. They were former Academy graduates, and helped with everything from sharpening weapons to patching up scrapes and running drills.

And one of the assistants during Zephyr’s attendance at the Academy had been Frida the Fierce.

Frida was a few years older than Zephyr, had graduated at the top of her class, and was perhaps the most beautiful girl Zephyr had ever seen. Vikings were rarely considered beautiful, and beauty was not something they treasured too highly, but Frida was undoubtedly beautiful. She could have been Freyja incarnated, with the way she possessed not only her beauty, but was beloved by all, and the way she was truly a goddess of war.

Zephyr had really admired her; had looked up to her skills, had appreciated her kindness, and had thought that she was simply just mildly envious of the way she wielded her attractiveness in a way that Zephyr felt she would never be capable of. It had never struck her to think that her feelings ran a little deeper than a simple student’s hero-worship, before it had all struck her square across the face one day.

Frida had tried to lecture Zephyr over having beaten Agnar’s upturned nose straight back into his thick skull ( _tried_ being the key word, seeing how she hadn’t even bothered hiding the smug approval underneath the scolding words), when Zephyr had suddenly realized that she would much rather have found out what Frida’s full lips would feel like pressed against her skin than to ever have to listen to Agnar’s, or any of the other boys’ for that matter, slimy comments again.

The impact of that realization had hit her so strongly that she would have thought that a Gronckle had sat down on her chest from the way she suddenly couldn’t breathe. The rest of Frida’s lecture had flown straight over her head, but she had managed to nod dumbly when she asked if Zephyr was never going to attempt a move like that again, and had then ignored her worried looks when she had scrambled her way out of the Academy with a speed that could probably have given even Toothless a fair match.

She hadn’t slowed down until she had ended up deep in the woods on the west side of the island, in a place where only Nuffink would find her if she was gone long enough for people to start looking. Plucking her knife out from where it was usually strapped to her hip these days, she had thrown it into the trunk of a tree enough times that it had eventually carved out a hole big enough for her to place her fist in.

She had always thought that she had liked boys and girls in equal measures; she had always gotten along with either of them well enough ever since a child. While Alfhid had always been, and would hopefully always be, her very closest friend, Vigge wasn’t very far behind, as long as he wasn’t being a Terrible Terror, and she actually didn’t really mind the boys at the Academy, as long as they removed their heads from their behinds long enough to be rational creatures for once. She had always learned and played and grown alongside girls and boys both, and had never really considered if she had had a preference.

But she had been realizing, more and more recently, that they weren’t children anymore. Vigge had been openly swooning after Ragna for moon cycles now, and for the last couple of weeks she had even started showing signs of interest in return. Alfhid would sigh loudly every time Zephyr wouldn’t indulge her in her musings of which boy could be thought to have the strongest muscles, deepest voice, or softest hair. Not to mention all of the foul comments that had started crawling out of the mouths of Agnar and his likes as soon as a girl was within just a few feet of them these days.

Zephyr had never been able to keep up with her friends’ newfound fantasies of dating and marrying boys, of starting families and growing old with them. She had always just assumed that she would have moved into a little cottage of her own, maybe growing old with another one of her lady friends if they would have felt so inclined.

Her newfound realization shouldn’t have been so shocking to her, she had realized, once she thought about it.

She had stayed in her little corner of the woods until the sun had set and the stars had come out. She had been sharpening her knife by the time Nuffink had found her, and he had only kicked at her feet and declared that dad’s stew was growing cold.

Zephyr had risen to her feet, had ruffled her babe brother’s hair for good measure, and had then followed him back into the village.

Trying to forget all she had realized that day.

Zephyr hadn’t forgotten though, rather quite the opposite. The same realization that she had had when she had wondered what Frida’s lips would feel like pressed to her skin suddenly wove its ways into her every day. She suddenly wondered what it would feel like to run her fingers through Ragna’s hair, when Helga’s laughter had suddenly become one of the sweetest sounds she had ever heard, and how Brynja’s calloused hands would fit into her own when it wasn’t to drag each other to and from various shenanigans all over the island.

She had even watched Alfhid play the harp one evening, mesmerized by her nimble fingers, and while she hadn’t been attracted to her _per se_ (Gods forbid), she had suddenly seen something in her that she hadn’t before.

Zephyr couldn’t forget, and what she was feeling would certainly not go away.

She had done her best at hiding it though, and soon enough, it was a little over a year later, and New Berk had been in the height of its bloom, the island lush and full of life, hustling and bustling and endlessly preparing for the looming winter they all knew was returning at the end of the sweetness of the summer. And while Zephyr would most likely never be a warrior, she had been newly graduated from the Warrior Academy, and that was really all that could be asked from the Chief apparent apparently.

She had so much more important matters to keep her mind on, was the excuse equal parts her own and everyone else's.

But between her warrior training, and Chiefly tutoring, and being a teenager on an island full of them, she also somehow found time to simply just be Zephyr Haddock once in a while too.

She was sitting with her mom on the long trek of steps leading up to their house, a half-sown sail draped between them. Sail sowing was usually done down by the docks, by the shipwrights, and would normally most likely be finished with much better results.

But the sail between them wasn’t just any sail; it was the sail meant to be attached to Nuffink’s first boat, the first one he would be able to call his very own. Seeing how it was the sail meant to be attached to a first-time dinghy, it wasn’t all that big, and could be comfortably divided between two people. It was still a good couple of nights worth of work though, especially considering the head of a Night Fury that had been stitched boldly into the center of the cloth, tightly winged by a Deadly Nadder.

(Mom wasn’t that good with a nail, and neither was Zephyr, but gran was.)

And while Zephyr wasn’t all that great with a nail, and seeing how there really was no reason for this to not be done by the professionals down by the docks, it still felt right, doing this for Nuffink. Mom and dad and gran had sowed the sail for her first boat (which she had promptly run into the nearest sea stack just the year before; Nuffink had always been meant to be the true seafarer between the two of them), and it felt right, having a hand in giving this to her little brother.

It had taken her such a long time, and it had been hard work, to learn how to love her brother. She still felt sick to her stomach when she thought back to his very first days of life; of seeing her mom, strong and tough and fearless Astrid Haddock, so tired, so frail, so _weak_. She had hated it, had hated _him_ , and had hated the entire world for making everything so bloody complicated.

But she had taken her time and she had done the work, and in the end it had all paid off. She _did_ love her babe brother as fiercely as she knew how. He was the flesh of her flesh and the blood of her blood, after all. He was a piece of her just as much as he was a piece of their mom and their dad.

The Haddock family. The constant leaders of Berk.

Zephyr paused with her needle in hand, and gazed out far into the horizon. Out into where the sun was slowly setting, where the Hidden World laid hidden away somewhere, and where Nuffink would most likely discover entirely new worlds of his own one day. 

He had always experienced freedom so differently than Zephyr had.

“Mom?” she asked, before she was even fully aware of what she was doing.

 _Chronic overthinkers with an impulsive streak_ , was what mom used to describe her and dad as.

She probably wasn’t entirely wrong.

Mom also just hummed in response, still focused on the neat row of stitches by her hands.

Zephyr clutched onto the cloth that was draped over her lap, feeling like Toothless had just decided to drop down from high above the clouds straight into the deep of the ocean with absolutely no regards to her clutching desperately onto his back. She could feel her heart slowly rising in her throat.

But she was a Haddock, and they didn’t let fear rule their lives.

“Is it,” she said, having to peel her tongue from the roof of her mouth. “Is it okay for girls to like other girls?”

Her mom started at that, tilting her head before she turned to give Zephyr a questioning look and oh Gods, oh Gods, this was how she was going to die, this was how Zephyr Hedda Haddock was going to be dragged into Hel, by admitting that-

“Of course,” her mom said, with a confused crease in between her eyebrows, and Zephyr’s heart suddenly plummeted back into her stomach. “Zephyr, love between women is one of the most important forces in this world. I know, trust me, _I know_ , how easy it can be at your age, to be swept away by the beliefs of you somehow being _more_ , being _worthier_ , than your fellow sisters, but-”

Zephyr was caught somewhere between wanting to smack a hand over her own face and to just run away from this conversation and pretend it had never occured. But she was a Haddock, so of course she decided to just grab the Yak by the horns instead. “No, no, no, mom, I didn’t- I mean, I love my sisterhood, I _do_ , but that’s not what I, I mean-”

Stumbling over her own tongue enough time to trail off, mom just continued to study her with a curious expression. Her mom had always been straightforward and sensible, but she had also always been open to listen to her dad’s most absurd ideas, and oh boy, wasn’t Zephyr about to give him a run for his silver.

She was really going to die, wasn’t she.

Wringing the sail in her hands, she could feel her nails digging into her palms even through the thick cloth. “I mean. Is it… Okay, for girls. To like other girls, the way- The way most other girls like boys?”

Her mom just continued to stare at her for a while, and Zephyr was really very certain that this was what dying felt like.

It took another few moments, but then the coin finally seemed to fall into place, and her mom’s face smoothed in understanding as she mumbled, “Oh.”

Zephyr was already halfway through a panicked backpedaling, to say that she was just asking, that it didn’t mean anything, that _she_ wasn’t like that, when her mom suddenly scooted across the few steps that separated them, reaching out to brush Zephyr’s bangs out of her eyes.

“The answer is still _of course_ ,” she said with a tentative smile, settling her hand on Zephyr’s shoulder.

And while Zephyr felt something inside of her break, it also felt like the jorth itself had been lifted off of her shoulders.

Her mom’s thumb brushed the underside of her jaw, and then she withdrew her hand to settle them in her lap, and she studied her intertwined fingers for a long, long moment.

“I know,” she finally said, her voice catching. “I know we aren’t the best at showing it, but _of course_ it’s okay. We’re vikings, which means we are very fond of our traditions, but if there was one thing I had hoped you already knew about Berk is that we’re _not_ narrow minded.”

Mom smiled weakly at her again, and then turned her gaze out to the shimmering horizon.

“We not only made peace with the dragons, we became their _champions_. We went against the very grain of what it meant to be a viking; we became peacekeepers and created a haven instead of constantly waging wars and causing destruction in our wake. We’re stubborn and coarse and obstinate like few others, but you know that most of us aren’t intolerant.

“You know we’ve never looked at uncle Gobber any differently, and you know everyone is aware of why Eret never married. You know that Gothi’s position as Elder isn’t the only reason she’s an old maid, and you know why Li-Lee was chosen as her apprentice. You know why Mulch and Bucket have been in charge of the fishing trade, and you know why Lina and Grizel are looking to take over after them.”

Squinting against the last of the sunset, mom turned to look at her again, and it was with a troubled look in her eyes. “It is not the norm, no, and it’s not going to be easily accepted, less so because of who and what you are to Berk, and I’m so sorry for that my darling, but you _know_ that we’re in your corner. Berk has been through many changes in my lifetime alone, and this is not going to be the biggest of them.

“And Zephyr, my breeze, you’re the heir of Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, and you’re going to accomplish anything and everything you set your mind to. Who you choose to love should be the least of your problems.”

Mom smiled at her again, and Zephyr wanted to believe her, she really, really did. But instead she sniffed, blinking back tears that she refused acknowledge were blurring her vision.

Her mom frowned and reached out to dry tears that still hadn’t fallen. “Oh hush, hush, hush, hush, it’s okay-”

Zephyr swatted away her hands, a sudden irritation and dread blending low and deep in her gut. “No, but that’s just it, isn’t it? I’m the heir of the Chiefdom, and isn’t it my principal duty to bring forth an heir on my own-”

“Zephyr!” her mom cried with a fire and intensity that surprised her, and Zephyr had to remind herself that her mom had been one of the best dragon riders on all of Berk once upon a time. “Gods help me, you’re _16 years old._ You’ve just had your first moon blood, children should be the _last_ thing on your mind.”

“But-”

“No, no buts!” her mom exclaimed, and then grabbed a hold of Zephyr’s chin to force her to keep looking at her even when she tried to duck her head. “Your principal duty is to live and to learn, and to one day be the best Chief you could possibly be for Berk. That’s all; nothing more and nothing less.”

Zephyr didn’t know what kind of response her mom wanted to that, and could only stare at her. Mom’s fierce gaze softened after a few moments, and released the hard grip she had had on Zephyr’s chin, settling the hand around the back of her neck instead, rubbing soothing circles into the base of her head.

“The Haddocks have led the Hooligans for six generations, but that’s mostly out of luck and opportunity and ingenuity more than anything else.” Mom paused, seeming to ponder something, and then said, “Did you know that your father almost got himself disinherited as the heir when he was your age?”

Zephyr dried her nose with the back of her hand before scrunching it up in confusion. “What?”

“It’s true. Before,” mom said, and there was that longing look in her eyes. “Before the dragons, when we were still a people of primarily warriors, your father was looked down upon. He couldn’t wield a sword, could barely hold a shield, and had an uncanny habit of always getting himself into trouble. Never quite grew out of that one, I suppose.”

The look mom gave her was wicked enough to lure a laugh out of Zephyr, no matter how bad she still felt.

“But your father was smart, he has always been inventive, but no one would listen to him. I’m still ashamed of the fact that I wouldn’t either. Before your father was Hiccup the Great, Hiccup the Conqueror, he was Hiccup the Useless. He was almost stripped of his place as heir. And there were whispers of giving Snotlout the position in his place.”

Zephyr frowned. “Uncle Snotlout?”

Mom laughed, and there was the mom that Zephyr recognized. “Yeah, can you imagine that? Uncle Snotlout; Chief and leader of Berk?”

Zephyr tried to smile, because the thought _was_ indeed very funny. Her attempt must have failed quite miserably though, seeing how mom immediately turned more somber again. “What I’m trying to say is, if your father hadn’t been your father, and he hadn’t brought dragons into our lives and changed Berk for all the better, then there is a big possibility of us having a Jorgenson as Chief. And while everything else would have been horrible and terrible and outright _nightmarish_ , the succession of the Chiefdom wouldn’t have been a big question.

“The Chiefdom has stayed with the Haddocks because Haddocks make the finest chiefs around, a tradition there is no doubt in my mind about you continuing. But the Haddocks aren’t the only thing keeping Berk from the brink of ruin. We don’t owe this tribe any more than the service we are willing to give. We don’t owe them heirs or new chiefs. Those have always been offered willingly and freely.”

And Zephyr had already had this conversation with her parents, multiple times; as firstborn she had been granted the position of heir (even if her entire life had been a fight with tooth and nail to get her accepted as such, simply because she had been born with all the things her brother hadn’t), but she had the right to turn it down had she wanted to. She wasn’t forced to accept anything she didn’t want to.

Her mom tightened her hold around the back of her neck, and raised her chin again with her other hand. “You don’t owe this island anything you don’t want to give it.”

Mom raised her eyebrows after a moment, and Zephyr nodded, an affirmation that she understood. 

Mom released her after that, and Zephyr took advantage of her regained personal space to wipe at her nose again, while her mom fiddled with the sail still draped over their laps. There had an entire evening gone to waste, just because Zephyr couldn’t keep her stupid mouth shut.

“How long have you carried this?”

Zephyr looked up at mom’s question. She was gazing out onto the horizon again, at the twilight that was slowly settling over them, and Zephyr shrugged. “A few years.”

“Oh, baby.”

Her mom almost sounded heartbroken.

Before Zephyr knew what was going on, she had been pulled into a bone crushing hug.

“I’m sorry,” her mom mumbled into her hair, and her arms were warm and steady and secure around her, and Zephyr almost felt like a child again. ( _Still are one_ , her dad’s voice rang in her head.) “I’m so sorry we ever made you doubt that you wouldn’t be able to confide this to us. You’re our daughter Zephyr, and we’ll always love you, no matter what.”

And yep, those were definitely tears on Zephyr’s cheeks.

“Of course it’s okay to love other girls. Just as it’s okay to love men, and everything beyond and in between. Great Odin, you could fall in love with a Yak, and we’d still approve, as long as it made you happy. We just want you to be _happy_ , baby.”

Zephyr wrapped her own arms around her mom, and allowed herself to be rocked the way she had as a little girl. Her mom held onto her as twilight turned into dusk and and into night, and for the first time since she’d realized that she maybe wasn’t like most other girls, she thought that maybe things would be alright anyway.

* * *

Telling her dad and brother had been far less dramatic than telling her mom, and she wasn’t really sure why she had expected anything else. Dad had accepted it with all of his endless optimism and delight, not having a single care that this was far from the most optimal situation as far as Berk’s leadership came, and was more than ready to accept a daughter-in-law into the family right away.

(Zephyr tried not to panic _too_ much about _that_ prospect.)

Nuffink had just frowned, his nose scrunched up, before declaring that his only dissent was that the house would be full of “double-cooties” from now on, and had then promptly changed the subject to all that he had learnt at the Sailing Academy that day.

Mom had been more than enraptured by that conversation, letting him spin tale after tale for the rest of the evening. Zephyr had smiled as she had listened to her brother, happy to know that his world hadn’t shifted under his feet because of this. Then her dad had gripped a hold of her shoulder, and had smiled down at her, with a twinkle in his eyes that said _I’m proud of you_ , and it was- Alright. It was okay.

Zephyr may not be like most other girls, but that was fine. She was still Zephyr Haddock, she still had her family, and because of that, everything would work out in the end.

As that summer turned to autumn, she had also started confiding her truth to her friends. Alfhid had just given her a strange look and said “wait, what, was that something I was supposed to not know already?”, while Brynja had smiled that warm and comforting smile of hers and revealed that she had always had a hunch, and Vigge had given her an even stranger look than Alfhid and said “wait, that’s a _thing?_ ”. And Zephyr had started to wonder if maybe this wasn’t such a large of a thing as she was making it out to be.

There was a reason why Gobber, and Eret, and Gothi, and Li-Lee, and Mulch and Bucket and Lina and Grizel were as beloved as everyone else in the village, after all.

She had decided not to tell the council directly though. They were reluctant enough to accept her as her dad’s heir as it was, and she wasn’t about to give them more ground to constantly question her on.

But she had also decided not to hide who she was any longer, and to not be ashamed if she let her gaze linger a little too long after one of the girls she met in the town square. The boys were allowed to constantly oogle after any girl they so choose to, after all.

With the bitter bite of winter also came Nuffink’s 13th birthday, and the reveal of all of their several moon cycles of hard work of getting his boat ready. Nuffink had cursed mom, dad, Zephyr, gran, Gobber, even the council, and also the Gods themselves, when he hadn’t been allowed to take it out to sea right away. But no matter how good of a sailor he already was, and the fact that the sea never quite froze over further out from their island, the ocean’s freezing depths and tricky waves were simply too dangerous to traverse out on, even for the most experienced sailor.

It had then been Zephyr’s turn to trek out, in waist deep snow and with a Yak pelt wrapped tightly around her shoulders, into the western part of the woods in order to drag him back to his own birthday feast.

Zephyr could have kept a clock from how precise and meticulous Nuffink had been in counting the days, hours, minutes and seconds until the spring equinox arrived. Berk had still been covered in snow and true spring had been at least a moon cycle away still, but the sea had cleared up and calmed down most of its bitter winter deviousness, and Nuffink had almost vibrated out of his own skin from the excitement as he had stood upon the skydock overlooking their southern shores and watched as his boat had been prepared to be lowered down to the freezing depths below.

Mom had been running over her final warnings and instructions again - he wasn’t to go out of their sights, and he wasn’t to try any funny moves - but Nuffink had just laughed as he had jumped into the boat that had just started its slow descent down, and had laughed all the way until it had touched the rocky waters below. And then he was off, dancing across the rough water as if he had been born for it, his laughter echoing all the way back to them.

He had, as Zephyr had expected, expertly navigated around the sea stacks she herself had gotten caught on during her first voyage, and had quickly raced further and further out into the ocean until he was little more than just a tiny dot on the horizon. Mom had called out after him, Zephyr never doubting that her voice would carry the distance, and the dot danced across the horizon for a while before it returned to a little more comfortable distance.

It had soon became clear that Nuffink was not returning any time soon though, and Zephyr had offered to keep an eye on him as her parents went off to deal with more important matters. She had accepted the deckhands’ offer of lunch, and had then sat down crosslegged on the pier overlooking the sea, watching the sail with the Night Fury and Deadly Nadder being expertly handled under her brother’s capable hands until the sun had set again, and she had been forced to lure him back onto land.

Not that he would stay stranded for long.

With the summer also came their biennial trip to the Hidden World, and the Haddocks had once again been reunited with their dragons. Zephyr had once again been reminded of the terrifying thrill of flying, and just how much she loved it. She had also been forced to face the fact of just how quickly the Night Lights really grew; 10 years since she had met them for the first time, 2 since she had seen them last, and she had almost not been able to recognize them.

They had recognized Zephyr though, or had rather recognized her smell, seeing how she had gone through a growth spurt or two of her own in that time, and some bonds were strong enough to endure all the physical changes in the world.

But as Zephyr had learnt already as a small girl; all good things had to come to an end, and after one last flight atop of Stormfly, it was time to say goodbye again. Dad had held onto Toothless for so long Zephyr was beginning to suspect he had transformed into a statue, but then the Night Fury had hummed low in his belly and licked dad across the face. Dad had groaned about the smell never coming out, as he always did, had hugged Toothless one final time, and had then urged him and the rest of the dragons to return to where they belonged.

The dragons had been sitting on top of the cliffs leading into the Hidden World as they had sailed away again, watching them leave. Zephyr and her family had been standing together, bundled close, as they had watched their friends disappear in the mist again.

But there would come another year, and another visit.

Zephyr had awakened about a week later, not really understanding what was going on, the world still not bright enough, still too quiet for it to be morning already. Blinking her bleary eyes and turning around in her bed, all she saw was the silhouette of what looked like her dad standing in her doorway, clutching what looked like a piece of parchment in hand.

“It’s Nuffink,” he said, and Zephyr had never heard him sound like that before. “He’s gone.”

Zephyr immediately sat up, all traces of sleep gone from her mind.

Nuffink had left them a note, scribbled in his usual illegible hand, explaining that he couldn’t stand it any longer, that he couldn’t stand being away from Toothless and Stormfly and the rest of the dragons for so long again, and that he had set off for the Hidden World.

Racing down to the docks in the early morning light, Zephyr hot on her mom and dad’s heels, they found that Nuffink’s boat was indeed missing, and that no one had seen a trace of him. Zephyr’s parents had prepared their own voyage ship in less than 10 minutes, and then they had set out after him. Dad had taken up the helm and her mom had kept track of the rigging as soon as Berk was no more than a speck behind them, leaving Zephyr to keep a weather eye on the horizon.

She honestly didn’t know what had gotten into him. Nuffink was usually smarter than this, usually thought longer than to his own nose; there was no way in Hel that his small little dinghy could make it all the way across the ocean to where the Hidden World was hidden, and Nuffink was more than aware of that.

So what on jorth was he thinking with?

A dread so awful that Zephyr didn’t think that she would ever be able to put words to it settled deep in her gut. And it would take weeks for her to get rid of it again.

It took them two days before they finally found him.

Two days of endless searching, two days of her mom almost grinding the blade of her axe down to nothing, two days of her dad being on the brink of ripping his own hair out, and two days of Zephyr being so worried she could barely think.

In the end, it was a miracle that they even did. There had been no way of tracking him, no way of knowing if he had even gone in the right direction. But dad had had a gut feeling, and mom and Zephyr had trusted that, and they had ended up scouting the far archipelago just outside of New Berk’s territories.

And late, late in the day of that second day, they had run across a tiny island with a ragged and uneven shoreline, where a boat had been crushed and smashed to pieces against its scraggly cliffs, and where a sail, a sail that Zephyr would have recognized anywhere, with the head of a Night Fury and a Deadly Nadder having been meticulously stitched into its fabric, had been dragged up in its tattered pieces onto the beach.

Their own ship had almost been smashed to pieces along with the dinghy in dad’s haste to get them ashore, and mom had jumped off of the deck and into the shallows long before that.

Nuffink had been sitting curled up with his knees to his chest on the rocky shore, and had had a look in his eyes like he hadn’t been able to believe what he was seeing when they finally made their way over to him.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he sobbed, over and over again, into their mom’s chest, with dirt streaked across his cheeks, with holes in his clothes and one of his boots missing, his voice hoarse. “I just thought, I thought-”

Mom hushed him and hugged him tighter. “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay. You’re safe now.”

Zephyr had only been able to stare at him, not really sure she could believe what she was seeing herself. It had taken her dad’s hand to land heavy on her shoulder to shake herself out of the trance, and the palpable relief on his face when she turned to look up at him was almost painful to watch.

Zephyr wound her arms around him, and he had clutched onto her just as fiercely in turn.

Nuffink hadn’t slept in her bed for years; not since they had been children and their dad had told them about the Red Death for the first time. Nuffink had been wide eyed and excited in the evening, had been listening as attentively as Zephyr had done as dad told them the tales of one endless heroics after another. But he had also come tiptoeing into Zephyr’s room that night in the dark, whispering about the fear of a Monstrous Nightmare coming to snatch him away, to offer him to an ill-intended alpha that may still be hiding out there in the world.

Zephyr had let him stay, had even offered him her old stuffed Night Fury to keep him company in the dark. And she had promised him, that between hers and the King of Dragon’s protection, he would never come to harm.

He was still clutching onto that very same replica of the Night Fury he had set out to visit when they had finally brought him back home again. He had passed out to sleep as soon as his head had hit a pillow, and he was curled up in Zephyr’s bed, in part because he had told them that he didn’t want to be alone at night again, and in part because neither her, mom, nor dad, could stand the thought of having him out of their sights. 

Zephyr had spent hours just sitting beside her own bed, watching her brother clutching onto her old stuffed toy and breathing peacefully as he slept. She was having trouble accepting the fact that he had actually returned home, safe, and in one piece.

Reaching out, she carefully threaded her fingers into his messy hair, brushing some of it out of his face, careful not to disturb him.

“I thought I was going to lose you.”

Forming the words in her mouth and letting them fall from her lips removed some of the pressure from her chest, and she pushed up onto her knees in order to press a light kiss to his forehead. Then she climbed up onto the bed behind him, curled up close, close enough to feel his steady heartbeat against her own, and finally allowed herself to rest too.

* * *

It had been another year before Nuffink had decided that maybe cooties weren’t so bad after all.

He was 14, had just hit his first major growth spurt with gangly limbs hanging all over the place, his voice constantly shifting registers, and had started to lock himself up tight every morning, not even letting dad see him before he had “woken properly”. He was also a fledgling student at the Warrior Academy, and for the first time in his life he had been forced to spend the majority of his time surrounded by girls without the constant allure of the sea distracting him.

Zephyr, at the end of her own teens, on the run from what her dad called “aggressive diplomacy cultivation”, and with a newfound overprotectiveness of her baby brother after last years’ mishap, had taken up a habit of watching the Academy sessions in the afternoons. It was a nice little trip down memory lane, watching Eret drill a new batch of younglings in how to best grip a sword, how to handle a shield, and how to _not_ use a mallet. It was also nice seeing her brother constantly make a fool of himself, and to have endless of new material to tease him over at dinner each night.

That wasn’t the only reason she was kept drawn towards the Academy arena day after day though.

There was also a new valkyrie ruling over the Academy, by the name of Signy the Savage.

Zephyr and Signy were the same age, but while Zephyr had spent most of her childhood and beyond with Alfhid the musician, Vigge the scholar, and Brynja the agriculturer, Signy had spent hers with her fellow warriors, soldiers, and champions. You didn’t grow up on New Berk without knowing each other though, and Zephyr and Signy were acquainted, were even close enough to friends, but they had never been more than that. 

She had never been more than a passing presence and a fleeting interest.

Now though. Oh, now though.

Signy Yngvarrson was the best warrior of their generation, had graduated at the top of their class, and was already making a name for herself among the people built upon the backs of legendary warriors. She was Eret’s head assistant, and could always be found drilling their students as hard as her master, often with an even coarser edge to her teaching.

But she was also a beam of sunshine personified, with hair the shade of seasoned honey, and skin as soft and weathered as the pale limestone cliffs in the far south. While her condemnation was harsher than the bitter winter winds, her praise and encouragement were as sweet as the first spring breeze, if not sweeter still. She had a smile with edges that were sharper than a razor blade, and her eyes always seemed to sparkle with a particular kind of challenge.

Zephyr had first fallen in love with that smile and those eyes.

And she had pined, for moon cycle after moon cycle, in silence, and would have been happy to continue to do so, unless her so called “friends” hadn’t intervened. (And okay, maybe she hadn’t been so silent about it, but it was really all Vigge’s fault, for breaking into the fermentation cellar at the Thawfest, and Zephyr was never so much as _looking_ at mead ever again.)

And so she had been thrown into the Academy arena at the end of the fledgling class one day, which wasn’t all that out of the ordinary, seeing how she usually picked up Nuffink at the end of each class, but this time she had a dare that she would either ask Signy out or she would have to paint Crotchety Cricket’s house in fish guts this coming evening. Zephyr had glared up at her friends her entire way down the arena walkway, but they had just urged her on, with their stupid grins and idiotic signs.

Oh, she really needed to get better friends.

Zephyr was dead set on just grabbing a hold of her brother and getting the Hel out of there, fully intent on finding some other way to get out of the Crotchety Cricket business. But even as the crowd of students and assistants and teachers at the academy thinned out, she suddenly couldn’t locate her constantly astray little brother, and she was just about to give up, to call it all a day and go mope in the woods, when something suddenly caught in the corner of her eye.

It was Signy, swinging an axe that had previously been used during that day’s class, and she was smiling, and it was a smile that seemed to shine brighter than the glaring sun above them, and sharper still. “Hey, Chief.”

Zephyr thought she managed to perform a feat by not tripping over her own feet. “Oh, oh, _I’m_ not the Chief, I’m just-”

“Chief-in-training,” Nuffink piped up from absolutely nowhere, somehow having managed to attach himself at her elbow.

Zephyr glared down at him, and almost thought that she hated him again. “Go eat Scuttleclaw shit.”

Nuffink blew a raspberry at her, which, wow, was really _way_ above his maturity grade, and, oh, _Gods_ , she can’t believe Signy just-

“He’s a cute kid,” Signy said, with an indulgent and awfully sincere smile on her lips as they watched him scuffle off to the corner of the arena to strip off his armour. 

“He’s- The worst,” Zephyr said, watching Signy swing her axe in her hands with a careless grace, trying not the be too mesmerized. “I can’t believe I have to live with him.”

Signy laughed as she threw the axe at one of the targets the students had been trying to hit earlier, easily nailing the bullseye. “Can’t be worse than three older brothers still living at home.”

Zephyr squinted as she watched Signy pick up some stray knives from the dirt. “I’ll bet you on that one.”

Signy was smiling as she turned around to face her again, and it was that smile that shone brighter than the sun, but that was okay, because Zephyr couldn’t imagine anything better than to drown in its blaze and-

“So, are you just here to pick up the varmint, or did you want anything else?” Signy asked, brushing some of her hair out of her face.

Zephyr’s tongue suddenly felt like it was glued to the top of her mouth.

But. She’d come this far, hadn’t she.

“Um. Um, yeah, about that, I was actually, I was wondering, eh, I was wondering, I mean, that is, if you would like, to, but only if you’re interested, to, like, maybe, one day-”

Signy held up her hand and gave her that same stern look that she gave her students, and Zephyr immediately shut up.

Just like her to go and put her foot in her mouth and screw everything up. Oh well, at least she’d given it a shot. No one could blame her for lack of trying. _Take that Vigge and his stupid fish guts-_

“Yes.”

Zephyr blinked. “What?”

She watched as the hint of a mischievous smile curled the corner of Signy’s mouth. “You’re trying to ask me out, right?”

Zephyr could only nod dumly.

“Then; yes, I would love that.”

Zephyr could only stare at her.

What in Freyja’s name was going on?

“Cool,” she said, and her voice wasn’t doing weird things at all. “Awesome. I mean, if you’re really sure, but only if you’re really sure, and you have to be really sure, but if you are really sure, then I’d also love to, like, maybe-”

Signy offered her a look that Zephyr could only describe as fond, no matter how improbable that may have been, and then promptly cut her off, as if she had been training her entire life to do just that. “Meet me at the south cliff sides at dusk?”

“Yeah! I mean, if that works for you, then that totally works for me to, that’s totally cool, I mean-”

Signy did roll her eyes this time, but it was with a sweet smile that displayed all of her sharp teeth. Then she reached out, grabbed a hold of the leather string holding Zephyr’s shoulder pads in place, janked until she had dragged her down to her level and pressed a quick kiss to Zephyr’s cheek.

Zephyr could honest to Odin feel her breath hitch.

Signy’s lips were dry and chapped, but her breath was sweet and soft, and Zephyr could feel the brief contact tingle all the way down to her fingertips.

There was a shy shade to her mischievous smirk once she let go of Zephyr and rightened herself again. But her eyes were as steady and unwavering as ever, and still sparkling with that particular challenge. “I’ve been wanting to do that for years.”

“Huh,” was Zephyr’s brilliant reply.

Signy just smiled and winked, before bending down to pick up another stray knife and turning around, waving her goodbye over her shoulder. “See you later Chief!”

“Cool,” Zephyr said, to apparently no one at all, as she watched her leave. “Awesome. Wow.”

“You’re gaping wider than a screaming Thunderdrum,” Nuffink said as he suddenly popped up at her elbow again.

Zephyr’s mouth immediately snapped shut. “Shut up.”

* * *

While becoming smitten by Signy had been as natural as the seasons’ progression and happened all at once, actually falling in love with her had been a gradual learning process. She and Zephyr were far from a yak’s horn to a helmet. Where Zephyr was cautious, Signy was reckless, where Signy was brash, Zephyr was prudent, and they could rarely agree on any one thing. Where Zephyr was obstinate like few others, Signy had an easier time to just let bygones be bygones, and their wills and temperaments clashed more often than they got along.

But they also saw something in one another that they had yet to find in anyone else.

Their first date at the southern cliff sides had been little more than just getting to know each other a little more, even if Signy had kissed Zephyr’s cheek again before she had said goodbye, and Zephyr could have sworn that she was floating ten feet above the ground. Their second date had progressed very much in the same way, Zephyr having taken Signy up to the western hillsides, and the third, when Signy had snuck them away to a hidden cavern on the north side of the island.

And while Zephyr was frustrated with her general heedlessness and her thoughtlessness when it came to her own safety most of the time, she also admired her loyalty, her wit and her endless humor. 

She looked at Zephyr in a way she had never been seen before. She trusted her with a faith that was unwavering. And she loved her with all that she was worth, which was all true also in return.

Zephyr would most likely always carry a tiny ball of fear in her chest, and while that lump inevitably always grew heavier whenever Signy did something foolhardy, Signy’s very presence was also one of the very few things that could soothe her for long enough to feel like the it didn’t exist at all for a little while. Signy would most likely always be her greatest concern, but she was also her greatest peace.

The first time she had kissed her, Zephyr felt like she could have jumped off of the edge of the world without a worry at all.

Other times, it felt like she would drown in the depths of her own fears.

They hadn’t regularly seen each other for more than five moon cycles the first time Signy had scared her halfway to death.

Zephyr had been watching the Academy’s Elite class session, waiting until Signy would have the rest of the afternoon free to go explore the forests on the far east of the island, and hiding from her dad’s sheep settlement lectures (even though her dad had been more than aware of where she was spending most of her time by then). Her afternoons spent down at the Academy were seldom a waste of time though, and she had been busy working on how to improve the islands’ many ship lifts. The lifts had been an ingenious idea on her dad’s part when they had first settled at New Berk, but they had been developed and built in all haste, and had then been abandoned as soon as they had been functional enough, overlooked in favor of other problems needing solving as their people built themselves their new home. But if Zephyr could only get the crane to-

If her eyes were drawn to a pair of strong and pale arms, and the flash of honey colored hair from time to time, then that was nothing she had to justify. And if Signy had noticed her staring, and winked up at her in response before thoroughly kicking Agnar’s butt, then she had tried to not blush too fiercely and to keep the butterflies in her stomach in check.

The Elite class was surely a sight to behold; all of Berk’s best and most promising warriors gathered in order to push and encourage each other to all become faster, stronger, and better. It was all of their tribe’s greatest young skills condensed into one single training field.

In hindsight, it really shouldn’t have been all that surprising that that setup had just been a keg full of Zippleback gas waiting for a spark to ignite it.

The afternoon’s class had just been ended, swords and axes and maces being gathered up and helmets and guards and armour being stripped as Eret shouted instructions and reminders over the noise of it all. The atmosphere of the Elite class was rough, the best of the best and the worst of the worst of all of Berk being gathered in one isolated group, but there was also a camaraderie present; underneath the constant competition and rivalry and one-upmanship there was a true sense of friendship, an acknowledgement that they were among peers.

That being said, it was far from uncommon that scuffles broke out from within their own ranks.

Zephyr hadn’t registered what had started the fight, had been too absorbed in her own sketches and ideas, but she did notice when it gained a crowd. And she paid it all of her attention once she realized that Signy was smack in the middle of it.

Signy, without her helmet and only with her most basic armour in place, was caught in a complicated exchange of blows with Agnar. Agnar had always been the uncontested second behind her, and had been scratching with both beaks and claws for years to find some kind of way to topple her from her place as the best of their generation.

There was a reason why he hadn’t succeeded in all those years though, and Signy was smiling, laughing even, as she met him blow for blow. Agnar still had most of his armour and his sword too, but Signy still held the obvious upper hand, finding ways to outmaneuver him still as the rest of their classmates egged them both on.

It wasn’t long until Signy gained that battle hardened smirk and raised her already bruised fists for the finishing blow.

And Agnar, either in a moment of panic, lack of sentience, or just having his true bastard finally coming through, struck her upon the head with his sword.

Luckily, or deliberately, depending on which side you viewed it from, he seemed to hit with mostly the flat side of it. Agnar was no lanky runt though, and just the force of his blow was enough to send Signy staggering, even knocking her clean of her feet. Signy’s unprotected head hit the dirt hard, and in the dirt it stayed.

Zephyr’s pen clattered to the ground and her ship lift sketches flew to the wind as she was suddenly on her feet, her own breath knocked from her lungs.

“Signy?” she could hear Agnar call even from where she was standing, tearing his own helmet off for better sight and movement, kneeling down beside his fallen opponent. “Signy? Yngvarrson, come on, this isn’t funny!”

Zephyr had rounded the public stands and the side of the arena in a heartbeat, and was well on her way through the entrance when she was suddenly stopped short.

“Oi, lass,” Gobber said, the hook of his left hand having crooked around her upper arm, stopping her in her tracks. The look he offered her as she turned around to face him was as sympathetic as it was worried. “Don’t ya think it’s better ya ran after Li-Lee instead?”

Zephyr gently removed her arm from his hook, careful not to scratch herself on the uneven edges, and stared up at him as steadily as she knew how. “I’m not leaving her.”

Gobber just inspected her for a moment longer, before he sighed and got a depleted look in his eyes, probably remembering that she had somehow managed to inherit both of her parents’ stubbornness, and gestured for her to go ahead. Zephyr had given him a grateful look before she had continued her interrupted dash into the arena.

Most of the class had gathered around Signy’s still lifeless form, and Zephyr could feel her own heart slowly sinking through her chest. Eret had been on his knees beside her, gently slapping her face and calling her name. The crowd had slowly dissipated as Zephyr had approached, the two of them not having been nearly as discreet about their whole relationship than she would have hoped, and Zephyr fell to her knees in the dirt on the opposite side of Eret. He had offered her a signification look that she had tried not to think too much about.

“Signy?” she asked, clutching onto her hand. It was a relief, to feel her pulse underneath her fingers and to see her breathing, but she was still knocked out cold. And Zephyr had heard about this, had read about it, about people getting blows to the head so severe that they passed out and never woke up again, of having a heart that beat but still not being alive, slowly dying in their unconsciousness as they withered away, and-

Signy groaned, a sound coming from deep and low in her belly, not unlike a dragon growling. Then she coughed, before she groaned again, and then her eyes slowly fluttered open, and Zephyr could feel her heart slowly gaining altitude again.

“Signy?” Eret asked as he grabbed a hold of her face, keeping it steady, trying to force her to look up at him. “Signy, can you hear me?”

Signy just cracked a smile around another groan, and the look she had as she stared up Zephyr was so sickly adoring that Zephyr almost felt bad _for_ her. “Am I in Valhalla?”

Most of Signy’s classmates behind them broke out in relieved laughter behind them, secure in their knowledge that Signy wasn’t broken beyond repair. And Zephyr couldn’t help the tug at her own lips, even as she felt yet another lecture about responsibility building at the back of her tongue.

“You’re not funny,” was all she settled on saying, for now. “Oh, dear Gods.” 

Signy just choked out what Zephyr assumed was a laugh, and then clutched onto her stomach.

Eret ordered everyone out of the arena after that, and had then spent the next following quarter of an hour checking up on Signy, making sure that she hadn’t broken or strained anything, and that her head was still screwed on somewhat straight. Zephyr had held onto her hand the entire time.

Once they had made sure that she could sit up without any major problems, Eret had decided to go see what was taking the messenger he had sent to Li-Lee so long, and had asked if Zephyr would mind tending to the small scrapes and bruises that Signy had still inevitably gained. He had offered her another significant look at that, which Zephyr had waved off as swiftly as she had done him, assuring him that that was no problem at all.

The first aid kit had still been stored where Zephyr remembered it. Signy had just squinted up at her as Zephyr had cleaned up the gash along her forehead and the scrape wound on her arm. She hadn’t said much of anything since she had come to again, except her initial question and her patient answers to all of Eret’s questions.

Zephyr was happy to work in silence though. She thought she needed time to get used to the abrupt declines and upswings that her heart seemed to constantly be performing around Signy.

She had known that she had _liked_ Signy before this, but she didn’t think it had actually registered just how much she really _cared_ about her.

And while Signy had been spared the usual lecture about her recklessness, Zephyr hadn’t been able to keep her lips sealed for any longer as she had been bandaging her bruised upper arm.

“I can’t stand the thought of losing you.”

Signy had just smiled up at her, and it had been strained, and tired, and weary, but had still managed to keep all of the sharp edges that it usually had. “You won’t.”

Zephyr had just huffed at her, tugging the bandage tighter. If Signy’s little yelp of discomfort had been just the tiniest bit satisfying, then that was no one’s business but her own.

There hadn’t been much of a point in trying to keep their budding relationship hidden after that. Zephyr had tried to keep it away from prying eyes and prodding fingers, not because she was ashamed or wanted to keep it a secret, but simply because she wanted something of her own that would _stay_ her own without the rest of Berk knowing about it before she herself did.

That had been a watertight strategy for all of about two weeks.

Granted, she had never had a chance to keep it secret from her friends, but her companions could be known to keep a secret when it really counted. Zephyr had never been all that good at lying or keeping secrets from her family though, and the second Frigg’s day after that first fateful afternoon in the Academy, her dad had invited Signy over for dinner. And while him and mom had done an exceptional job of embarrassing her to Hel and back and made her question why she had ever loved them, they had been respectful enough of Signy and their by then far from defined association.

She wished the same could have been said for Nuffink.

She couldn’t be all that upset with him though, seeing how she would soon enough get her fair share of revenge.

He had fallen head over heels in love with a girl in his warrior class, the young Inga Bardson. It had actually been a little funny, watching how completely engrossed he had become with her, so quickly, and so young. It had soon become obvious, not least when she evidently returned his affections, that she was the one and only for him, which Zephyr founds equal parts unbelievable and perfectly reasonable.

(Gobber had once told her that her dad had only ever had eyes for her mom, which she had found a little weird, up until she had tried to imagine her dad looking at anyone else the way he looked at mom, and how the very idea had made her head hurt.)

At 15, he was far from the age of having to withstand parental interrogations and the not-so-subtle societal wide implications of maybe getting betrothed the longer his relationship lasted. Zephyr, at 19, wasn’t so lucky.

Most of the island seemed incredibly invested in her and Signy’s relationship, both in their general well wishes of it, but also in their demand for details and in their wishes to somehow be a part of it, no matter how indirectly. Zephyr had found it incredibly transgressive, and had spent the better part of their first year together feeling like she was constantly on the run from prying eyes. Dad had had to tell her that that was simply what trying to have a private life as a Chief was like, and that it was just to get used to, as long as no one tried to pass a boundary that they really had no business passing.

Signy had relished in the attention, and Zephyr wouldn’t have been able to take that away from her even if she had been capable of it.

Signy had also pulled her up to dance around the bonfires during the midsummer celebration, and Zephyr, who had never liked dancing, even when Alfhid had been the one holding her hands, had danced and laughed all through the night.

The council hadn’t approved though, and unlike when she had first been questioned as heir, they disapproved explicitly and loudly. Zephyr had her family and a majority of her people at her back though, and maybe even more importantly, she had Signy by her side, and for once in her life, she couldn’t give a Thor’s worth damn what the council thought.

* * *

“Will you just get it over with already?”

Zephyr startled a little, so lost in her counting and not having expected someone to come looking for her. New Berk was deep in the midst of their harvest stocking, and not one resident was excused from all the hard work it included, even the Chief’s firstborn. Zephyr had been handed the dismal task of taking stock of all of their fermented fish, and had been tucked away in the village’s main root cellar the majority of the day.

The late autumn sun was sharp and cutting the few hours it managed to crawl over the horizon, and Zephyr had to squint as she looked up at her little brother standing bathen in its light in the doorway. “What?”

Nuffink rolled his eyes, and sure, Zephyr’s head was a little foggy from all the numbers, and the salts, and the acids, but she didn’t feel like he had the right to be _this_ annoyed with her just yet. “Will you just ask Signy to marry you already?"

Zephyr frowned as she rose from where she had been hunched over one of the last crates of fish tucked into the corner, her hands settling on her hips. “What’s it to you?”

“Because this is the one time dad has decided to be a stickler for traditions.”

“What in the Allfather’s name are you talking about?”

“Dad won’t let me and Inga get married before his firstborn has been wed, which means that you and Signy need to get a move on it already!” Nuffink said, throwing his hands up in the air.

Zephyr blinked as she watched him blow his bangs out of his eyes, an obvious sign of his frustration. He had never actually admitted to wanting to marry Inga before. The whole island was already aware of his intentions of course, but still.

Actually vocalizing his wishes was an important step for him to take.

And it made sense. Closing in on his 18th birthday, he was only a few moon cycles away from the age dad had been when he had asked mom to marry him. Granted, their betrothal had lasted longer than most, and they hadn’t actually gotten married until the year before Zephyr’s birth. Nuffink had always seemed to like to be just a few steps ahead though.

But what any of this had to do with her supposed marriage to Signy was beyond her, and Zephyr could only stare at her brother.

“What?”

“I said, dad won’t let us-”

“No, no, no, I heard, but what? Dad _said that?_ ”

Nuffink’s shoulders sagged and he averted his gaze, and Zephyr was suddenly filled with that pleasantly smug feeling of having him pinned. “Well, no, not outright, but it’s been _implied_ -”

“Implied how?” she asked, feeling the corners of her mouth curling into a satisfied smirk.

Nuffink huffed at his dangling hair again (he _really_ needed a haircut) and toed at some loose gravel on the ground. “Oh, you know, how he always goes on and on and _on_ about how it’ll be so nice to have the two prides of Berk as his daughters, how he can’t wait to throw a proper wedding feast again, and how this island hasn’t seen a grand Haddock marriage in much too long.”

Zephyr had indeed listened to dad’s wistful wedding spiels once or twice (or fifteen times, or twenty), but had never arrived at the same conclusions that Nuffink apparently had. If anything, she had thought that he had seen the same yearning look in Nuffink’s eyes as everyone else had, and had started enthusiastically preparing for when Inga would inevitably become a part of their family. She and Signy had never even been part of the equation in her mind.

Their dad had toppled so many other of their traditions already, and she really couldn’t see why he would hold onto this one out of all.

But that was not necessarily what she had to tell her brother at the moment.

“Aw, is someone jealous that their girlfriend isn’t being appreciated enough?” she asked instead, not even bothering trying to hide her smug grin.

Nuffink glared up at her through his fringe. “That’s not it and you know it.”

Zephyr scrunched her nose, if only just to see the way Nuffink’s eyebrows drew together in irritation. “Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure- That’s not the point!” Nuffink said, shaking his head. “Will you just ask her? Please? If you won’t do it for Signy and yourself, then do it for me? Please? It can be my early Snoggletog gift.”

Zephyr snorted as she watched the hopeless hope shining through his eyes. “I'm giving you charcoal, as every year.”

Nuffink stuck his tongue out at her, and wow, they really hadn’t grown out of this yet, had they. “I love you too, Gronckle-butt.”

Zephyr stuck her own tongue out in response, because if Nuffink could still be so childish, then so could she. Nuffink just rolled his eyes before turning around to leave, throwing his hands up in the air again. “Think about it!”

Zephyr watched him leave in the setting autumn sun, a smile on her lips even as she was surrounded by rotten and fetid fish.

 _Signy Haddock_. Could probably have a pretty nice ring to it, one day.

* * *

“Zephyr!”

Zephyr turned around from where she had been trying to settle a conflict involving Gustav and Sten’s sheep, a conflict that was so infected and complicated that she was starting having problems keeping the facts straight and also developing a major headache. Her afternoon instantly became a little brighter as soon as she saw Signy sprinting up the hill where Berk’s main grazing ground was situated though.

“Signy?”

Signy had thrown her arms around her as soon as she came within arms reach and had swung her up into the air, not having a care in the world of the 3 inches that Zephyr had constantly held over her.

“Oh, oh okay, well, it’s nice to see you too, but-” Zephyr started to say as soon as Signy had put her down on the ground again, and as soon as the air had returned to her squeezed out lungs, but the rest of her sentence was swallowed up by the firm kiss Signy placed on her lips.

Zephyr could only stare at her in mild confusion as soon as she was released again.

“I love your family!” was all Signy offered as an explanation, wearing a grin so wide it looked like it would split her cheeks.

Zephyr didn’t ease up on her confused look. “Well, that’s nice, seeing how you’re going to be a part of it one day, but what does that have to-”

“Your parents just named me General!” Signy exclaimed, smiling impossibly wider.

Zephyr’s heart plonked straight down to her feet.

“What?”

“You’re looking at General Yngvarrsson!”

So she hadn’t heard wrong then.

“Oh,” Zephyr said, trying to smile despite the hole in her chest. “Well, that’s, well, amazing, wow, that’s really-”

Signy’s grin immediately fell into a frown. “You don’t like it.”

It wasn’t a question. It was an accusation.

And Zephyr tried not to feel like the worst girlfriend ever.

“No! No, I _do_ ,” she said as she gripped a hold of Signy’s elbows, tugging her closer, and that was the truth. “This is an incredible accomplishment, and I’m _so proud_ of you; I know how hard you’ve worked for this, but it’s just-”

Zephyr swallowed, trying to ignore the lump of fear that was sitting high in her throat. Why was it always so hard trying to put words to why she suddenly felt like she was in a free fall?

“This is a _huge_ responsibility. You’re going to be in charge of all of our forces, you’re going to be the head of our security, and you. And you’re going to lead all of our expeditions and battles.” Zephyr paused, willing Signy to understand the weight of her words. “But I’m going to need you to come back to me, too.”

And something softer, something like understanding, flashed in Signy’s so often sharp eyes. She reached up to brush Zephyr’s hair out of her eyes, and framed her face with her hands as she leaned in closer. “You’re not going to lose me.”

Zephyr huffed as she rested her forehead against Signy’s own. “I better not be. What would a Chief be without her General?”

Signy smiled, and it was the razor blade sharp smile that Zephyr was used to. “Exactly.”

She pushed up onto her toes to kiss Zephyr again, and this time she was a little more prepared to return the gesture. Letting go of her, Signy let her hands trail from her face down her arms to grab a hold of her hands instead. “See you at dinner tonight?”

Zephyr nodded her affirmation, and Signy smiled as she squeezed her hands tighter as a way of goodbye, before she dashed off again as quickly as she had come, to most likely do- Whatever it was Generals actually did. Zephyr could only stare after her as she went.

And she continued to stare until there was a very pointed cough coming from behind her.

Jumping, and turning around, she tried to not let her blush scald her alive. “Sheep! Yes, of course, sheep, I’m so sorry gentlemen, where were we…?"

She was met with indulgent smiles, and an unsubtle but gentle steering back onto the matter at hand.

It was common knowledge around all of Berk that Signy Yngvarrson had their future Chief wrapped tightly around her very strong little finger after all.

* * *

It had just been a regular Odin’s day.

The council had had their weekly meeting, debating all the various different problems that had occured over the last week; the delay in one of their fishing hauls, the standing territory dispute between the Jorgensons and the Larsons, the accident with the younglings and the yak pasture. 

Zephyr, at 22, had finally gained the respect and recognition of most of the council, and she was a steadfast presence at her dad’s side, backing all of his more controversial ideas up, explaining his intentions when he got a little too lost inside of his own head, and raising suggestions of her own when dad was too busy playing peacemaker to think outside of the box. She had even taken up her mom’s place in the assembly, the Chieftess having stopped coming to the regular council meetings years ago, having declared three Haddocks to be redundant, and that Berk would get along just fine with just two.

At home, she had explained that it was about time that Zephyr learned to take up her rightful place outside of her dad’s shadow.

Dad had been more absent minded than usual during the entire meeting, his eyes glazed over and staring out into nowhere, and he had barely listened to anything anyone had said, leaving Zephyr to speak for all of their points. Zephyr hadn’t thought all that much about it though, had just chalked it up to dad having spent another sleepless night in his study working on some new project and being more committed to what was going on in that busy head of his than the outside world.

The meeting had eventually tapered out into the evening meal, the great hall eventually bustling with vikings all chatting and rattling and clattering. Once the meeting had come to its definite end, with Gobber raising the mead stein that had been attached to his prosthetic, dad had stood up and excused himself. Zephyr had smiled up at him in goodbye, thinking him wise in his decision to go home and rest or work out whatever problem was bothering him, and had thought that had been the end of it.

That was, until he barely made it halfway across the hall floor before he swayed on his feet and then collapsed into a boneless heap of fur and dark hair.

“Dad? Dad!”

The entire great hall was immediately up in arms. Sure, their Chief was a little dramatic, and had a flair for theatrics, but this wasn’t usually a part of his repertoire. He never went out of his way to actually cause people to worry about him. So it felt like the entire village had risen from their seats all at once to flock around the fallen Hiccup Haddock. 

But Zephyr had been the quickest of them all.

Kneeling down beside him and grabbing a hold of his cloak, she tugged until she got his lifeless body to turn onto its back, trying to ignore all the anxious murmuring above her and the even greater fear seizing a hold of her chest. He was still breathing, which quieted the panicked voice in her head telling her he was dead, but that was just a small victory. Grabbing a hold of her dad’s face, she gave it a vigorous shake, willing him to wake up again.

“Dad? Dad!”

The crowd around them dissipated as a burly figure made its way past them, and Zephyr could only stare up at Gobber in a helpless plea.

Gobber, technically the tribe’s elder in all but title, quickly barked out enough orders to make the anxious crowd disperse. A runner was sent off to fetch Li-Lee, Uncle Snotlout and Fishlegs were recruited to help carry the Chief through the village back to their house, and the rest were given stern orders to stay put.

The last thing the Chief needed was to have the entire island hovering over him like a flock of Terrors.

And Gobber, for all his years and for all that he complained about his bad back and worse joints, was still as strong as ever as he helped Uncle Snotlout haul dad’s limp body out of the Great Hall.

Zephyr had only been able to trail behind them, not sure of what else she could do. She had been aware enough to grab a hold of one of the younglings before they exited the hall though, and had sent a message to her mom.

Nuffink was out at sea and was meant to be on his way back, so there was no use in sending after him. He would come back sooner or later.

Preferably sooner, though.

Dad wasn’t the scrawny little kid he had once been, and it took Gobber and Uncle Snotlout and Fishlegs their good time to carry him across the village. Mom had been waiting outside of their house once they arrived, and had only spared them a silent and quick glance before she had opened the door for them.

Getting dad up the stairs and into her parents’ bed had been a minor feat, but they had eventually gotten him there. Uncle Snotlout and Fishlegs had bowed out of the room again as soon as all of dad’s limbs were accounted for, and Gobber had only given him a worried glance before he had squeezed mom’s shoulder and told her to call as soon as she needed anything.

Mom had been able to offer him a terse smile, and had then sat down next to dad on the bed, pressing a damp cloth to his forehead. Zephyr had taken a seat on his other side, grabbing a hold of his hand. He was still breathing, and he still had a pulse, but it was shallow, and weak.

Li-Lee couldn’t arrive soon enough.

Once she did, it was with her usual huff and puff, and she had prodded at dad’s defenseless form with her stick while she had asked mom and Zephyr about his last couple of days. Zephyr was surprised to realize that she hadn’t actually seen much of him lately, mostly just in passing glances as he had been running to and fro and hither and thither all over the island, and her mom recounted a similar tale.

Li-Lee huffed as she shooed Zephyr out of her seat, taking her place in order to lean over their Chief. Grabbing a hold of one of his eyelids and yanking it up without any ceremony, she stared into his pupil-less eyeball and cupped her other hand over his nose.

He was overworked, was the final verdict, after she had pushed and prodded at him some more. His body had finally succumbed to the considerable stress it was under, and had forced him to yield to the rest it so desperately needed and which he had denied it for so long. He was simply sleeping, and would hopefully wake up soon.

Li-Lee left them some incense, to help with the recovery, and would send over some herbs in the morning. She was to be called upon as soon as the Chief woke up again, but other than that, there was really nothing more to do than to wait.

Mom had listened and taken in all of the information with attentive eyes and with her head held high. She had wished Li-Lee goodbye, and it wasn’t until their front door had swung shut again that she allowed Zephyr to see the tremble in her fingers as she reached out to brush some of dad’s hair out of his face.

Zephyr had nonetheless been sent to the Yngvarrsons for the night, mom not wanting her to waste her night by being worried at home. Zephyr had argued, had wanted to stay by her dad’s side, but mom had been insistent. And watching the way she had clutched onto dad’s hand and the way her fingers were still trembling, she had surrendered. 

She had pressed a quick kiss to her mom’s temple and told her that she would come back as soon as she called after her, and that she’d return in the morning at the latest anyway. With one last glance at her dad lying peacefully in his own bed, truly looking like he was just sleeping, she had then set down the stairs and went out into the village again.

Signy had been standing outside on the Yngarrson porch, looking up to the Haddocks’. Word always travelled fast across New Berk, and bad words even faster, and she held out her arms toward Zephyr as soon as she came within eyesight.

Zephyr allowed herself to collapse into her arms, and let her comfort her through the night, let her try to soothe the screaming beast in her chest that insisted she was in the middle of a freefall with no way of getting caught, with whispered sweet nothings and murmured reassurances. They had to have faith in Li-Lee, or they would all truly be done for. He would wake up, sooner or later.

Preferably sooner, though.

Zephyr couldn’t actually remember if she had slept anything that night. All she knew was that she had rolled out of Signy’s bed while dawn was still breaking to lace up her boots again. Signy drooled in her sleep, a fact Zephyr had always found inexplicably endearing, and she had bent down to kiss her before she left. Signy had only groaned and shifted in her sleep, Zephyr brushing her hair out of her face.

Dad had still not woken up by the time Zephyr returned back home, and mom was still sitting by his side, seemingly not having moved at all during the night. There was a considerable strain in her posture, and Zephyr had kneeled down next to her slowly, careful not to startle her.

“Mom,” she said, gently coaxing the damp cloth out of her hands. “You need to rest too.”

Mom’s eyes slowly shifted over to her, before they widened in surprise, as if she hadn’t noticed her before then. Her hand cramped around Zephyr’s, and Zephyr squeezed it gently in return.

It took a few more moments to actually get her mom moving again, and Zephyr had sent her downstairs with another brief kiss to her temple. Once she had heard her settle down, hopefully tucked in on one of their spare couches, she had then taken up her place by dad’s bedside. 

Nuffink returned two days later, and dad had still not woken up. He had come storming up the stairs in a wild sprint, with an even wilder look in his eyes. His hair was still tousled from the ocean wind and he still smelled of sea salt, and he couldn’t have wasted many minutes on land before he had started his mad dash home.

He fell to his knees on the opposite side of the bed from where Zephyr was sitting, and she watched him struggle to accept the reality that she had had hours upon endless hours to come to terms with.

They set up a rotating schedule of who kept dad company after that, no one wanting to leave him alone, even if they all knew he was more than capable of looking after himself. Still, it didn’t feel right, and they took turns looking after him, resting downstairs, and going about all the various different responsibilities needed to keep the village going in the Chief’s absence.

Gran had also nestled herself into their little routine, taking up the place by dad’s bedside when mom needed to rest, Zephyr had to deal with something in the village, and Nuffink just needed to get out of the house to clear his head. 

It had been Moon day when Zephyr had trudged up the stairs to switch dad-watching shift with mom, going through all the motions of life entirely out of habit more than anything else by then, when she had stopped short in the doorway by the sight of her mom curled up against gran’s side. Mom had been passed out cold, the dark rings under her eyes evident even from a distance, while gran had been humming a slow lullaby as she had brushed her thumb over the knuckles of the one of dad’s hands that she had been holding. Inspecting the quiet scene for a quick moment, Zephyr had then soundlessly reatreated down the stairs again to settle back in front of the fire with Nuffink.

Threading her own fingers into her sleeping brother’s hair, she had trusted gran to have everything under control, and to come fetch her if she was needed.

It had been Odin’s day again, a whole week after dad had first collapsed, when Zephyr had found herself with the early night shift at her dad’s bedside. A single candlelight had flickered in the old and familiar bedroom, and Zephyr had tried to get some work done, reading over the treaty proposal that had been sent over by the Northlanders a few days prior.

Zephyr had thought it good enough, had made a few amendments, but all in all it wasn’t all that bad. Putting down her pen and the parchment, she looked down to where her dad was just lying peacefully, oblivious to all that was going on around him. Zephyr had felt like she had been falling for days now, and she had been successful enough at keeping the nagging voices in her head at bay, but now they grew overbearing.

_What if he never wakes up, what if he leaves you to take care of the island all on your own, what if you fail and disgrace his life’s work, what if, what if, what if?_

“Please, dad,” she whispered, praying to all the Gods she could think of that he would hear her. “Please, I can’t lose you.”

Sniffing back what she refused to believe was tears, she grabbed a careful hold of his hand, feeling his steady but frail pulse beating underneath her fingertips.

“I know- I know it isn’t fair, me asking that of you, seeing how you had to do all of this without grandpa, but. But you’re stronger than I am, dad. I know, I know you keep trying to tell me otherwise, but that’s simply not true. I’m not as strong as you are. I can’t do this without you. I just can’t.

“So please, daddy. Please don’t leave me.”

A teardrop landed on their joined hands, soon followed by another, and another, and Zephyr didn’t even try to stop them.

She couldn’t remember falling asleep, but when she woke up again, with strained and stained cheeks and with an awful crick in her back, it was to the familiar gesture of a hand stroking over the back of her head.

Zephyr immediately snapped to attention, so suddenly that the lingers of sleep made her dizzy, but that didn’t matter in the slightest.

“Dad?” she asked, trying to take in the sight that, yes, that was definitely her dad, tired and weak, but definitely awake, smiling at her. “Dad!”

Dad gave out a pained grunt as she threw herself at him, and she knew that she should probably have been more careful, but she couldn’t really be bothered to care about that at the moment, seeing how she could barely tell if she was laughing or crying.

Dad had just carefully pried her off of him, absently patting the hand that Zephyr had woven into the front of his tunic as she just stared down at him, unable to believe what she was seeing, when they were suddenly joined by the sound of the heavy fall of footsteps on the stairs.

“Hiccup!” her mom exclaimed as soon as she made it through the doorway and was able to inspect the scene in front of her. And there were tears in her mom’s eyes, tears she furiously tried to blink back. “Don’t you _ever_ scare me like that again, do you hear me?”

Dad just smiled, that patient and loving smile he only seemed to wear around mom, as he continued to pat Zephyr’s hand. “Yes, milady.”

“I mean it,” mom argued as she stalked up to the other side of the bed, and she had that look in her eyes that said she would have punched him unless he had literally just come back from the brink of death. “I don’t plan on joining you in Valhalla in quite some time yet, so you would have no one to beat some sense into you for far too long.”

Dad just continued to smile as he released Zephyr and reached out for mom instead. “It’s you and me, remember? We’re not striding into Valhalla together until many, many years from now.”

“We better not be,” mom said, and yup, those were definitely tears rolling down her cheeks. “Gods, you scared me.”

Mom was a little more careful as she sat down at the edge of the bed in order to wind her arms around him, but she clung onto him just as fiercely as Zephyr had done. Dad just hummed low in his stomach as he hugged her just as tightly in return.

Then there were another set of footsteps on the stairs, and Zephyr barely had time to turn around before Nuffink appeared in the doorway, with a still wild but relieved look in his green eyes. “Dad?”

Nuffink had just launched himself onto the bed, with no consideration whatsoever of the already jumbled mess of limbs and bodies that occupied it. Dad groaned again under the considerable weight of the assault he was succumbed to, but he also smiled as brightly as Zephyr had ever seen him do as he patted Nuffink on the back. “Hey, bud.”

They all broke down in relieved laughter after that, all clutching onto each other, and Zephyr suddenly felt like a child again, and like she had just taken her first flight.

They could wait a little longer with calling after Li-Lee.

* * *

The bearskin was heavy on Zephyr’s shoulders.

All of New Berk had gathered for the occasion, crowding together wherever they could to get the best view; along the docks, on the ramps leading down their steep cliffs, up on the cliff sides themselves. Zephyr had been granted a place on the bluff directly overlooking their fleet of ships all poised and ready to set off into the great unknown.

Nuffink had been begging for an expedition of this size for moon cycle after moon cycle now. He had heard words of a faraway lands in the south during his travels, stories of a whole other world far beyond the archipelago, of islands larger than you could imagine, islands stretching as far and wide as the ocean itself. Lands made up entirely of deserts, of mountains taller than the eye could see, and of creatures even more peculiar than dragons. 

He had begged their dad and the council both in turn to grant him an expedition to seek this faraway land, had pleaded until his knees were scraped sore, and now he had finally gotten his wish. 

His delight had been palpable as he stood on the prow of the leading ship, his cheeks covered in delicate clovers and fervently waving up at everyone that had come to wish them safe travels, his smile turning impossibly brighter as he turned to his sister. Signy wasn’t many steps behind him, looking as regal as she always did with her hair braided back and with a sword at her hip, and with the lines Zephyr had drawn upon her face in the Yngvarrson colors, looking up at her with her usual mischievous smirk and daring eyes.

It had been decided, after dad having fallen ill, that it was time to start a gradual succession of the Chiefdom. Her dad was still the acting Chief, and would continue to be so for as long as he wished, but Zephyr would also be handed more and more responsibilities. She would no longer just mediate sheep conflicts and run other official errands that her parents were too busy to take care of; she would become a proper co-chief by their side. She would be making decisions and handling official tribe proceedings.

Such as this.

Nuffink was the leader of the voyage, with a letter of introduction to any foreign tribes, signed by Zephyr on behalf of the Hairy Hooligans, tucked away somewhere safely on his person. Signy was the leader of their forces, having risen to a level of utter respect and reverence at a pace Zephyr could have only dreamed of doing herself, commanding both men and women almost twice her age with an iron fist.

And Zephyr was the leading Chief officer behind the entire operation, having overseen all of the planning, gone through all the detailing, and helped prepare the entire undertaking.

It was under her command the expedition was taking place.

Her very first act as acting co-chief.

She felt like she was standing on the edge of the world, just waiting to see if she would take flight or fall headfirst into her own ruin.

A newly tanned bear hide had been attached to her shoulders and the ceremonial sword had been placed in her hands, and she had been marched out to oversee the results of all of her hard labor, and to wave goodbye to all their brave sailors who was heading out on expedition that was scheduled to last at least three moon cycles. The many Berkians gathered on their shores wore just as expecting looks every time they glanced at her as they directed at the small armada of ships though, and Zephyr had to constantly remind herself to keep her chin high.

It was a comfort, and a solace, to have her parents at her back. Not just physically, but also metaphorically; she hadn’t gone one step on this road without constantly double checking with either one of her parents, even if they had only just assured her that she was doing fine.

(Her dad _had_ ducked around her elbow once to correct her hold on the sword though; to better display the glistening ruby inlaid in the hilt.)

The sun had just started to make itself known on the horizon by the time the last ship captain had signaled that they were ready to take off. Zephyr had taken a breath, sparing one final glance at her brother and beloved, both smiling up at her with their unbridled confidence.

Then she had raised Stormbringer, and all of Berk erupted into an unanimous, deafening roar as the first sail was released to the morning breeze.

A new dawn was rising.

* * *

Dad was sitting by the cliff side, overlooking the sea. His metal foot had been scraped deeply into the dirt and he had a faraway look in his eyes; turned in the direction of the Hidden World. Restless fingers had plucked at all the stray stones around him, rolling them around in his palms only long enough to get a better grip on them before sending them pummeling down to the sea below.

He had been fidgety ever since his illness; people were constantly urging him to slow down, even though he was already moving at what he perceived to be a painstakingly slow pace. Add that to the fact that Zephyr had taken over more of his official Chief duties, and that people were now more inclined to come to her instead of bothering him with their problems, and dad had, for maybe the first time in his life, more time on his hands than he knew what to do with.

He had spent more and more time in his study recently, reading and sketching and tinkering, but not even he could be holed up in there forever.

Their trip to go see Toothless and the others this summer would probably be good for him.

Zephyr made just enough noise as she approached him to not sneak up upon him, and then sat down beside him, curling up at his side just the way she had used to do as a kid.

Dad gave her a surprised look as he gazed down at her, but didn’t hesitate before he curled an arm around her, steadying her against him.

“Hey, windy.”

Zephyr couldn’t help smiling into his shoulder. “Have you ever thought about why you didn’t just name me Wendy instead?”

“Now, where would the zing in that be?”

“Ah, yes, because it’s always about the _zing_ with you, isn’t it?”

Her dad laughed at that, and Zephyr’s smile tugged wider. Making him laugh had always made her feel exactly like him throwing her high, high up in the air had done when she was little.

Dad’s smile was as warm as the setting sun, and the look in his eyes a little less wistful, once he settled down and reached up to push Zephyr’s braid over her shoulder so that he could tug her in a little closer. “Anything particular on your mind?”

Zephyr just hummed as she rested her head on his shoulder.

Dad had always downplayed himself; had always claimed that he was nothing special, that he was only scrambling and trying and mostly failing at living up to the legacy of his own father. 

But her dad was remarkable, and had always been, even if many people hadn’t been able to see it at first. He had been leading Berk all on his own at Zephyr’s age. And that hadn’t only entailed all the everyday leadership, like settling sheep conflicts and stocking up the harvest for the winter and making sure that the village got along smoothly enough. No, he had also led them through a war, a mass emigration, and the departure of dragons. He had founded New Berk, had built all of them a new home, and made sure that they had all found their way in their new life.

Her dad had accomplished wonders long, long before he had even reached Zephyr’s 23 harvests. 

And Zephyr really had no right to be this nervous about a simple observation expedition.

But she had also learnt, long ago, that she got nowhere by withholding the truth from her parents.

So exhaling the tightness in her chest, she said, “I just decreed the largest cross Atlantic expedition our tribe has seen in decades, if not centuries; an expedition which my baby brother is leading and my betrothed is charging. It’s kind of a lot to take in.”

Dad hummed in return as he bumped his bearded chin into her forehead. “I just watched my daughter decree the largest cross Atlantic expedition our tribe has seen in decades, if not centuries; an expedition which my son is leading and my future daughter-in-law is charging. It’s kind of a lot to take in for me too.”

Zephyr didn’t know what to do with that except laugh, and dad laughed with her as he hugged her tighter. They just sat like that together for a long moment, giggling giddily at each other, and it really did feel like she was a child again; the two of them having snuck off from her mom and brother’s sometimes all too serious nature.

Dad was the first to sober up out of the two of them, and as he did he pressed a quick kiss to the top of her head.

“Have I told you how proud I am of you?” he murmured into her hair, and Zephyr shrugged noncommittally. 

“A few times.”

“Because I am,” he said, and he sounded serious enough that Zephyr had to look up at him, and he was indeed looking down at her with somber and serious eyes. “I am so proud of you.”

Reaching out with the hand that wasn’t currently wrapped around her shoulder, he brushed some of her hair out of her face. “You’re going to make a better Chief than I could have ever dreamed of becoming.”

Zephyr wrinkled her nose as she averted her gaze, looking out to where the sun was slowly dipping behind the horizon instead.

“You may not think it, but you’ve got some pretty big boots to fill dad. Or, well, boot and pegleg.”

She could feel her dad’s smile in the way he ran his hand over the back of her head, a gesture she knew better than her own heart.

“It’s all just residue from my days as dragon trainer. I’m actually not all that good at Chiefing. Hel, it’s your mom that has always dragged most of the weight around here. I’m just her second fiddle.”

Zephyr didn’t believe that for a second, had seen with her own two eyes the way her dad had led their tribe as if it came as naturally to him as breathing. But she also knew that there was no arguing with him over this, and allowed him to look off into the horizon with that faraway look again.

“I’ve never been proper Chief material. I’ve always been an explorer.”

“So that’s where Nuffink gets it from.”

Dad turned to look down at her again, and there were those crinkles around his eyes that she was used to seeing there. “Ha! And you got all of your mother’s witticism.”

Zephyr thought it best to not remind him that that was not the _only_ place she had inherited it from.

Before she could think of something else to say though, that serious look had returned to dad’s eyes. “You also got all of your mother’s tenacity and all of your grandfather’s sense of responsibility. You’re going to be the finest Chief Berk’s ever seen.”

Zephyr flushed under the praise, having had years of hearing it but still somehow not having gotten used to it. Averting her gaze, she dug the toe of her boot into the dirt next to her dad’s prosthesis. 

“Something tells me that I’m going to be overshadowed by Hiccup the Fearless for quite some time.”

Her dad just smiled, slow and secure, and bright enough that she could see it even out of the corner of her eye. “No. Zephyr the Magnificent is the one who is going to bring New Berk into the new age.”

Zephyr allowed him to hug her closer again, taking the opportunity to tuck her head under his chin.

Dad had already conquered all of his fears. 

Maybe it was about time she did the same.

* * *

The small cabin had been washed in the grey light of pre-dawn.

There had been frantic movement all around them all the same, people shouting orders and requests left to right, and people running up and down piers with the final preparations and arrangements, the whole village alive and buzzing already. The small fishing cabin had been quiet and still though, undisturbed by the chaos outside.

Zephyr had been silent in concentration of her task; her fingers painted in the same green and yellow as the stripes she had drawn upon Signy’s face. They had spent the last night together, had spent every night of the last week, if not longer, together, and still Zephyr had felt like she couldn’t draw these last couple of moments out long enough.

Signy was supposed to be gone for at least three moon cycles, after all. It was understandable not wanting to let her go just yet.

Putting the finishing touches to the dab of paint covering her chin, she had rested the unstained parts of her palm against the unpainted parts of Signy’s cheek. “Please don’t make me lose you.”

The whisper had barely been audible even in the stillness of their own little secluded world.

But Signy, still drowsy with sleep and not at all looking like she was just about to go out and command one of Berk’s largest forces in years, had still smiled that sharp smile of hers as she leaned into Zephyr’s touch, completely ruining her not-yet-dry work. “You’re not going to.”

Zephyr had just trailed her thumb along her cheekbone, before bending down to press a kiss in between the spaces of paint on her forehead.

She should have known that the Gods had been smiling upon her for far too long.

* * *

They had ended up in the fine and warm sand, legs all tangled together and with their laughter weaving into the trees behind them. The sun was at their backs, the endless vastness of the ocean was all that was ahead of them, and Zephyr felt like she had the whole world at her fingertips.

She could still taste Signy’s taste on her tongue, her nails was still biting into the imprints on her hips, and the fire blazing in her heart burned with such an intensity that she thought it would never be put out again. Tipping her head back to gaze up at the embrace that she was resting in, Signy’s hair shone like a halo, her entire being glowing like the valkyrie Zephyr had always known that she was, and she had smiled down at her like it was the easiest thing in the world.

And that was the moment that Zephyr had known that she was the woman she was going to spend the rest of her life with.

She had once asked her dad, how he had _known_. Not how he had asked, because at that he had been useless, and when that time actually came she was going to ask her mom and figure it out on her own.

But how did you know that you loved someone so wholly, so completely, that you wanted to dedicate your entire life to them, love them to the end of their days?

Her dad had said that when the time came, there was no telling, you just knew. That had been a frustratingly insufficient answer at the time, but.

But she thought she understood now.

* * *

Something was wrong, that much was clear as soon as the first ship appeared on the horizon.

Not least because it was at least three weeks too early, and as the ships drew nearer, so did the sight of their ruined sails, crooked masts, and the wrecked remains of their hulls.

Words spread quickly across New Berk, and bad words quicker than most, and the entire island was soon gathered around the docks again, waiting for their broken fleet to return to the safety of their harbor. Where the ceremonials and festivities had taken place at their departure, a quiet sort of disquietude had taken its place upon their return.

Zephyr had immediately dropped the hammer and barbed wire she had been holding in order to settle yet another sheep pen conflict as soon as she had heard the whispers and seen the first shadows of ships on the horizon. No bearskin, and no Stormbringer this time around; her favorite, worn tunic and her hair caked through with mud and sweat would just have to do for the receival.

The crowd had parted in her way without her needing to even so much as signal for it, and she had been standing on top of the bluff overlooking the head of the docks by the time the leader ship pulled in to anchor. It looked like it would have barely made it another mile before having completely fallen apart.

A familiar head of blond hair stood at the prow of the ship, and had been among the first to step upon land again. Zephyr’s parents had joined her in the time it had taken for the fleet to reach the edges of their shores, and she heard relieved gasps coming from behind her at the sight.

“Nuffink!” Zephyr was unsurprised to see Inga breaking her way out of the crowd, running along the length of the pier in order to throw herself at him. Even from up that high, Zephyr had been able to tell that he was bruised, and battered, and that he swayed a little under the force of his betrothed’s assault, but otherwise he looked okay. He was standing, and had all limbs intact, and that was all that mattered for the moment.

Nuffink had focused all of his attention on Inga for a long moment, which he should. But once he had managed to most likely assured her that he wasn’t actually dying, he had suddenly looked up at Zephyr. Most of the rest of the fleet had drawn up to the docks in the time Nuffink and Inga had been caught up in their embrace, their troops gathering along the piers, in obvious gratitude at being back home again, reuniting with their loved ones, and tending to their wounded. Zephyr’s fastidious eyes had scanned the crowds, searching for that other familiar head of blonde hair.

But her brother’s gaze had drawn her own to him.

“Zephyr, I’m,” he called, and there was heartbreak and grief in his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

And Zephyr’s entire world had suddenly crumbled to pieces, the ground giving way underneath her feet.

“No,” she said, not giving a single flying damn about the comforting hands of her parents on her shoulders and arms, or the expectant and apprehensive looks lying heavy all around her. “No.”

If the crowd had parted for her before, then that was nothing compared to the way they all scattered out of her way as she charged down the steep cliffs, out onto the long piers, nearly stumbling in her haste several times, tearing onto the ship at the far end of the fleet.

The ship carrying their dead.

Zephyr could have recognized Signy anywhere and any time, and she had immediately been able to pick out her silhouette in the long line of her fallen comrades, even with a thin white sheet covering her.

And seeing her still and lifeless form, as dead as all the long and lost heroes that she had now joined, Zephyr was no longer able to deny the reality of what she was facing. She was no longer able to live in the world where her brother had decided to play most horrible and worst imaginable prank on her.

“No,” was all she could say again, even if she wasn’t sure the word actually got out of her mouth, as her knees gave out from under her. “No.”

She thought she was crying, but she couldn’t be sure.

She was suddenly numb all over.

Reaching out to gently grasp onto the remains of what was left of Zephyr’s life, wanting to hold her just one last time, she realized that this was far, far worse than falling, worse than crashing, worse than burning.

Just like her teardrops dropping from her chin, she was just ash, scattered to the cruel east wind.

* * *

It had taken them days to finally sort out the whole story of what had happened, in between the commotion of their sudden return, tending to their wounded and- And burying their dead.

Nuffink had told her the abridged version of it as he had sat beside her bedside the night of their return, just after- After they had delivered the last of the burial ships to the sea.

They had made it out of the archipelago, and had made good headway in their journey south, had even sailed past some interesting islands on their way. But then they had come across a people of trappers, vile traders, _slavers_ , and they had tried to outrun them, to outsmart them, but they had eventually had no choice but to take them on, to try to drive them off.

They had barely all survived it.

And they wouldn’t have, if it hadn’t been for Signy. They had already lost a lot of people, had already lost a lot of strong and good people, by the time Signy had risked and given her life for the chance of getting the rest of them out of the slavers’ clutches and back home safe.

The expedition had long since been lost, but their General had been able to save what was left of their people.

She had been placed in the same broken vessel that had carried her lifeless body all the way across the Northern sea back home again. Hers has been the last ship pushed out into the sea, the last to have been set aflame, and had been the one to burn brightest and the longest. 

It had been a funeral worthy of a champion of Valhalla; a saviour of their people.

Zephyr had been proud of her, she really had been. But she had also not been able to see her set off against the horizon once again, this time knowing that there really was no coming back.

“Zephyr, I’m sorry,” her brother murmured again, his bruised and bandaged hand carefully curling around her ankle. “I’m so sorry.”

Zephyr had only been able to answer by another broken sob, and then her brother’s arms were around her, crawling up into the bed beside her, hugging her tight.

They had cried themselves to sleep alongside one another.

Time became nothing more than an abstract concept to Zephyr after that.

She had no idea of how long she had stayed holed up in her room, curled up on her bed, after that. Days, weeks, months, years, what did it matter. Her family had taken turns staying by her side, keeping her company, and trying to motivate her to try and at least get out of the bed again. She had just firmly and tonelessly asked them to leave each time they did, ignoring the heartache and grief in their eyes every time they left.

It had been morning, or at least she had thought it was by the light coming in from her closed windows, when she could no longer feel the scent of Signy that had clung onto her pillows.

She had been given her dad’s wedding brooches, the one with Night Furies etched deeply into the gold, just a few weeks after the expedition had first set out to sea. Her dad had smiled so wide as he had handed them over, so excited for them to finally have use again. And Zephyr, who had never understood all the ado surrounding the whole ordeal, hadn’t been able to stop herself from smiling along with him.

Suddenly overcome with a bitterness so deep that she thought it would swallow her whole, she now hurled them against the far wall of her room. The thick disks of gold gave a satisfying thump as they collided with the wood, leaving a considerable dent in it before they scattered to the floor. 

Zephyr was all cried out, had expelled so many tears that she thought she wouldn’t be able to cry any more for the rest of her days, but a scream tore its way out of her lungs, drawing all the way from her toes and cutting her throat all the way out until she was left kneeling double over herself, gasping for breath.

She hated flying. She hated, hated, _hated it_.

The exciting thrill of it wasn't worth the pain of falling. Crashing.

Burning.

* * *

They had been doing something so mundane as cleaning that days shipment of fish, when Signy had suddenly broken down in foolish laughter.

Zephyr had barely looked up from where she had been tearing fish guts out of a salmon’s belly as she had asked, “What’s so funny?”

It had taken several minutes before Signy had sobered up again, a new round of giggles breaking out every time she tried to speak. But she had eventually cleared her throat, and had looked at Zephyr with that razor blade sharp smile.

“I just realized that I’m going to be the next Chieftess.”

Zephyr had frowned as she had paused briefly before tearing the fish’s spine out. “Who told you that?”

Signy had only snorted before returning to tend to her own fish. 

“You. When you asked me to marry you.”

“I never said I was co-chiefing.”

“So you’re just going to do both your mom _and_ your dad’s work all on your own?”

“Don’t look so surprised.”

“And you’re really declaring this right after your dad nearly worked himself to death?”

“Well, that’s because he’s a weakling.”

“Oh _, harsh_.”

“He’s my _dad_. You try saying something like that about the Chief and you would probably hang.”

“Mm, I don’t know about that. I’m in pretty good favour of the next Chief.”

Zephyr had glanced up to where Signy had come to stand hovering above her, with that challenging glint in her eyes and sharp smirk on her lips. “I thought you said you were the next Chieftess?”

“Well, that too.” 

Zephyr had been the one to finally cave and had reached up to pull her down for a kiss, fish guts tangled into furs and hair be damned.

* * *

Zephyr had carried her grief for the better part of a decade.

The main reason why she hadn’t allowed herself to open her heart again was because she was scared. She was scared of getting hurt, she was scared that opening her heart would just get it crushed again, when she had spent so long trying to mend it back together. She was scared of losing.

And she already had so much still to lose.

But also, even as cruel as it made her sound towards her fellow tribeswomen, there were just no other that had caught her eye the way Signy had. Gran had told her once, not long before she had passed away, that some loves were so great that they only came about once in a lifetime. That once they had touched your heart, it was theirs forever.

Signy had carried Zephyr’s heart with her to Valhalla along with her own soul, and Zephyr wasn’t sure it would ever return. And even if it did, she was worried that it would just be taken away again.

So Zephyr had kept her grief tucked away alongside the vacant hollow in her chest, but had found a way to keep going. To keep growing, learning, and living.

Berk had recovered from that dismal accident with the expedition, and had found a way to keep moving, as they always had. They had mourned their losses, had tended to their grief, and then they had set about trying to rebuild from what could be salvaged from the remains.

And Zephyr had done her best at trying to keep up.

The council had been as cruel as they’d ever been; had questioned her abilities as Chief, if she was just going to crumble to dust every time she faced a failed mission, had fought every single one of her decisions, seeing how her first task as acting Chief had cost them nearly half of their best and brightest warriors, had started demanding that it was high time that she started producing heirs of her own as soon as she had passed her 25th harvest.

Then there were the even crueler still; saying that Signy dying was the price she had to pay for loving a woman.

Her father had stood steadfast by her side though, and her position as heir and Chief had laid as unyielding as the bedrock beneath them.

And so she had slowly, and painstakingly, clawed back the respect she had once held over them, reminded them of the reverence they had once regarded her with. She was Zephyr Haddock after all, the commander of thunder and bringer of storms. She had walked the edges of Hel and come back unschathed. She wasn’t about to let some shoddy and musty old _men_ tell her what she could and couldn’t do.

Besides, it wasn’t like the Haddocks would ever die out, if the rate at which Nuffink and Inga were multiplying was any indication. Zephyr had been 28 when her nephew was born, and the island had gladly accepted him as their heir presumptive in their long wait to see if Zephyr would have any children of her own. His triplet little sisters had been born not even three years later, and at the age of 5 he was waiting to become an older brother again.

Zephyr often wondered just when her brother found the time to not only create but also raise his family, seeing how it felt he was out to sea more often than he was at home. Only a few years after that ill-fated expedition, he had managed to gather enough support for yet another try. Agreeing to a much smaller company, it had only taken him three times before he had finally managed to make contact with the land of the endless deserts. And after, even more and even more distant tribes besides. 

The map, the beaten and patched up poor thing, which Zephyr and Nuffink had unearthed from somewhere deep within their father’s study, had slowly but surely expanded under their careful supervision. Nuffink was in constant pursuit of the edge of the world, and under Zephyr’s careful instructions, he made friends and allies and more than one enemy during all of his travels.

The world was wide and vast, but it had never managed to stop a determined Haddock before.

So Nuffink traveled far and wide, and Zephyr had more than her hands full trying to keep up with all of the diplomatic connections he wove for her. Zephyr kept herself mostly at home, most at ease with the steady ground of Berk underneath her feet, greeting the steady stream of emissaries, ambassadors, and diplomats, and even the occasional Chief or Monarch, that arrived at their shores looking to negotiate treaties or trades, or to simply keep up amiable relations. She relayed most of the overseas relations to her dad, allowing him to get the wind underneath his wings again, even if it was only by the way of sail. 

Once they were set to greet the Emir of the Rose Deserts though, they were both present at Berk’s southern shores to greet them welcome.

“Hiccup, my old friend!” Malak, the Rose Emir, exclaimed as he had gathered the Hooligan in question up into a bone crushing hug. The two had only met a handful of times, but the Emir had immediately taken to Zephyr’s dad as if they had been long lost brother’s by the heart. 

Her dad had been a little more hesitant to the whole idea.

“You remember Zephyr,” her dad said as soon as he had been released, doing an impressive job at hiding his wheeze, but not as subtly rubbing at his sore ribs. There was grey splattered through his thick hair by now, growing into the sides of his beard. But the last couple of years, spending more time traveling and discovering the word far beyond their own realm of it than he did at home, had also brought a sparkle into his eyes that Zephyr couldn’t remember ever having seen in them before.

Berk could succeed in taking their Chief out of adventuring, but not the adventuring out of their Chief, she supposed.

“Yes, of course!” Malak replied, with a whole other type of twinkle in his eyes as he reached out to place a gentle kiss to the back of Zephyr’s hand. “Every year that grows heavier on your father only stands to make you more beautiful, Chief Zephyr.”

Zephyr accepted the comment with an easy smile. Malak was known for being as easy on his admiration of young women as he was unyielding in his negotiations. There was no point in getting on his bad side already.

Releasing Zephyr’s hand with an extravagant bow, he turned to grab a hearty hold of Zephyr’s dad instead. “I’m afraid you won’t get to see much of Amar this visit though, he insisted on exploring those geysers and glaciers of yours up east.”

That last bit had been said with an apologetic smile in Zephyr’s direction, and she had to force her smile to tug even wider in return.

Malak had been trying to negotiate a marriage between his eldest and Zephyr for as long as Zephyr could remember knowing him, even though Amar was closer to her dad’s age than her own. Zephyr also didn’t really know what he was thinking; it wasn’t like they could co-rule, considering the great distance between their two domains. And it wasn’t like she was about to give up her Chiefdom, not after all the blood, sweat, and tears it had take her to secure it in the first place.

(It also wasn’t like Nuffink would be able to rule in her place even if given half the chance; he had always been even more of a restless soul than their father was.)

Zephyr also had a feeling that Malak would be far more successful trying to arrange a marriage between his son and Eret, but that was so far from what she would dip her nose into.

But his main point still stood; a marriage would definitely solidify their alliance.

Dad just smiled as he tried to stop the Emir’s vigorous shaking. “We’re sad to see his loss, of course, but this means that he may be able to see Nuffink, at least. He’s also up by the glaciers at this moment.”

That immediately turned Malak’s concerned frown upside down. “This is the visit for sons and daughters, then!” he exclaimed, beaming wide. “May I introduce you both to Sara, my youngest.”

Turning around, Malak gestured to the lithe form that had soundlessly snuck up beside him.

And Zephyr could feel her heart momentarily stutter.

Malak’s gaze turned into something between contemplating and mischievous as he looked between his daughter and Zephyr. “I’m actually surprised you haven’t met before; can’t be more than a harvest separating you.”

Sara of the Rose Deserts had skin that had been tanned dark and deep by the harsh sun of the south, and her hair was as black as their darkest night, shining in ripples the way the stark moon often did on the lone waters surrounding Berk. But her smile was razor sharp, and her eyes sparkled with a particular kind of challenge.

“It’s an honor to finally meet you, Chief,” she said, stretching out her hand as an offer.

For the first time in years, Zephyr's heart felt like it soared. And for the first time in even longer, she didn’t worry about all the possibilities of it falling and crashing and burning.

She had always been best at ignoring her fears while up in the clouds, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> I managed to cram in 30 years in under 30k, so all in all, I’m still pretty pleased with myself.
> 
> [tumblr](http://stolligaseptember.tumblr.com/)


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